Puella Magi Kiseki Magica
by Grimgrendel
Summary: Kyubey: "It's you." Homura: "What do you mean?" Kyubey sounded fascinated. He continued, keeping his eyes on the duo of pink and purple, down in the city: "You were the Walpurgis night. And now Madoka changed you back as the girl you were before." Homura: "Wait, are you saying..." Kyubey: " Yes. Now, there are two Homura Akemis."
1. Chapter 1: A Wish of Hope

This story takes place as an alternative ending of the anime Puella Magi Madoka Magica. It is highly recommended, if not mandatory, to have finished the anime, as my story is based on the outcomes of the last few episodes. If you did not watch the anime, please refrain from reading this fanfiction until you do.

Here is the first chapter. Hope you enjoy it.

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Puella Magi Kiseki Magica

Chapter 1: A Wish of Hope

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Homura Akemi was doing her best. Thousands of rocket launchers fired simultaneously, all aimed at the humongous monster floating above the city's ruins. In vain. She then dropped a dozen of bombs right in the huge screw of Walpurgis Night. In vain. Two more explosions made the twin electric towers collapse on the witch. In vain. A truck full of fuel blew directly to its face. In vain. As she dropped in the water below, three more battle ships levitate out of the river, and shot point blank guided missiles. In vain. Another three hundred thousand landmines were added to the count. In vain.

Walpurgis simply rose again, laughing of its maddened voice, unscratched. It was its turn to attack.

"Homura-chan!"

"It's too much for her alone." Kyubey stood next to Madoka, both watching the fight from afar, or more precisely: the massacre. Madoka was trembling. There was no way for her friend to win, she would only get killed.

"You know I can make a contract at anytime."

Yes, there was that possibility; that one thing that caused Homura to loop back history so many times. She could become a Puella Magi, but if she failed, she would then become a witch even more fearsome than the Walpurgis Night. She had one move; there wasn't any room for mistakes.

"I will!" Kyubey shook its ears, malicious satisfaction hidden under his cat smile. "Kyubey, I want to make a contract."

"What is your wish?"

"I wish to have the power to change any witch back to the girl she was before, to give her a second chance, and a third if necessary. I want to be able to shelter her and any other from the grief and give her the normal life she deserves."

"That wish would break the rules of the existence of witches!"

"I don't care what rule it breaks. This is my wish, so make it happen Incubator!"

There was a flash of pink light as Madoka's soul was extract from her body and placed in a soul gem, her soul gem. The process caught Homura's attention off the fight.

"Madoka! Don't do it!" She screamed, but as everything she did before, it was all in vain. Kyubey had already granted her wish.

"Your wish has reverse entropy. You are now a Puella Magi."

Madoka in her new pink dress of a magical girl didn't look back. She was focused on her target, determined to save all _three_ of them. Slowly, as if testing her own power, she took her wand, which transformed into a bow of light, aimed and shot. A ray of pure energy hit Walpurgis, completely engulfing it in a pink beam. When the ray vanished, Walpurgis had too. A small falling black dot in the sky was all that was left of the witch.

As the reality warp started to dissipate, Madoka flew and caught the falling girl softly in her arms. She was naked, had long purple hair and seemed peacefully asleep. But something was off. Really off. Her appearance was a huge shock to Madoka.

Kyubey had also seen the girl from afar. Homura was standing next to him, bloody from a building Walpurgis threw at her earlier. "It's you."

"What do you mean?" said Homura.

Kyubey sounded fascinated. He continued, keeping his eyes on the duo of pink and purple, down in the city: "You were the Walpurgis Night. And now Madoka changed you back as the girl you were before."

"Wait, are you saying..."

"Yes. Now, there are two Homura Akemis."

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(||—||)

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"What should we do?" Madoka had taken the second Homura Akemi out of sight in a small alley, quickly followed by the other Puella Magi and Kyubey.

"Maybe we should bring her clothes first." Kyubey came closer the sleeping girl, watching carefully any details that could prove him wrong on its first impression. There was no mistaking it; she was Homura's perfect twin.

The real one — or would it be better to says the one of this world? — simply stood there, shocked. She couldn't take her eyes off her solid reflection, refusing to admit the truth. The truth that she herself was the cause of her own misfortune. She was/had been/will be the Walpurgis Night she fought for so long. All that time, she was fighting herself, her own demons, without knowing it. It made the revelation even more painful.

"Homura-chan?"

Startled, she remembered Madoka existed — you know, the pink girl currently holding your other self? — and made visible effort to look in her direction more than a few seconds at a time.

"What."

"Clothes. Yours, maybe."

She instantly vanished, only to reappear a few meters away the next second, holding a purple dress she had never worn in her arms. With both working together, they were able to dress Homura2, still with some difficulties. Probably toying around with her body wake her up, or maybe she had just recovered from the past events, but as soon as she had a bit of consciousness, she kicked both girls and started screaming.

"Where am I? Who are you? Please help me! Somebody! I'm being attacked by two girls!"

Madoka was trying to get close to her, gently. "Homura-chan, calm down!"

The other Homura twitched at the sound of her name being used to call somebody else. Weird feeling she was sure she disliked.

"How do you know my name? Are you stalkers?"

Kyubey walked right in the middle of the two, preventing Madoka from coming closer. "You still don't get who that girl at the back is?"

There was no reaction whatsoever from Homura2.

"Kyubey, does she not see you?" asked Madoka.

"Who's Kyubey?" the poor girl was as afraid as she was confused

"Seems like so. Let me arrange that."

There was a small startle cry as the now completely awaken girl stared Kyubey.

"Let me ask again. Did you not realize yet who the second girl behind Madoka is?"

She gave one long look to the small being at her feet, frozen at the facts that he simply popped from nowhere and could talk, and then she understood the question and gave another long, good look at both girls, especially the one in purple. There was _something_ familiar with her, but she couldn't grasp it.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Homura Akemi."

"Eh? How is that possible? I'm Homura Akemi too!"

They took a long time to fully analyse the other. It was hard to admit the facts. The silence being really unpleasant, Madoka started to talk. "Hum, Homu... Argh! This is so confusing. From now on, YOU" pointing at the girl with the shield "are Homura and YOU" this time pointing at the casually dressed one "are Akemi. With this out of the way, Akemi-chan, what is the last thing you remember?"

Akemi was able to calm down a bit; those girls were not aggressive at all and heck, one of them was _her_. So she thought a bit over her last memories.

"It's all blurry, as if I had been in a maelstrom of colors. It's hard to concentrate."

"Does 'Walpurgis Night' rings any bells?"

"Homura!"

It did. As soon as she had pronounced the words, Akemi's face changed back to fear. "...Madoka? It's really you! I remember! But why are you a Puella Magi? Why are you alive? The last time I left you, I had shot your Soul gem!"

"Why YOU!" Homura was visibly angry for unknown reasons. She took an aggressive step forward, threatening Akemi.

"Homura-chan, stop it! Akemi-chan, why did you shoot my Soul gem?"

"We had defeated the Walpurgis Night together, and both our gems were pitch black, so I shot yours before you turned into a witch."

"And after? Did you shot yours?" Madoka asked.

Akemi blinked twice. "I don't remember anything after that."

"So you transformed into another Walpurgis Night from the shock of killing your friend."

"Homura-chan, please stop being rude!"

Akemi became many shades paler. "I... I... I became Walpurgis?" She was on the verge of crying.

It was at that time that Kyubey decided to kick in. "Absolutely. You became a magnificent witch, probably started a rampage across many universes, and when you showed up here, Madoka made the wish to bring you back to your former self. This is very intriguing, I must say."

Akemi started to sob, trying to stop from outright crying in from of Madoka. She was supposed to save her, not the other way around, and certainly not become a monster and threaten her world. And then it hit her. Hard. How many times had she failed, leaving behind a doomed world? Now how many of those did she, as a witch, completely erased from existence? This time, she wasn't able to stop crying.

"You don't help at all, Incubator." Homura said.

"Akemi, it's all right." Madoka took her by the hand and pulled her gently out of the alley, reverting back to normal clothes. "You're in shock, and we are too. But everything is over now, so let's just go somewhere more comfortable than an alley, and let's think over it calmly, shall we?"

"Okay, *sob*, but don't let go of my hand. I'm half blind without my glasses."

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(||—||)

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They finally decided to go to Homura's house, the other choice being Madoka's. The house was a huge ultramodern living room with white digital walls, filled with two pendulums, a bunch of sofas, a bed, a single table and a ton of sheets, photos, drawing and math equations, all about witches, displayed on the walls. There was also a small fridge and a microwave, which Homura put to good use by preparing instant diner. All three sat at the table, not talking, not looking at each other. The awkwardness of the unreel resemblance between Homura and Akemi was only amplified because both sat in the exact same position, mirror image of each other.

At one point, Akemi shyly asked for a hairbrush to arrange her hair into two large braids, the way she liked it the most — but really, it was first and for all to feel distinct from her doppelganger.

"Here," says Homura, giving Akemi her glasses. "I don't need them, but you do, and they fit."

"Thanks, H... Homura-c...chan." _Wow, that was awkward!_ _And why does she get the intimate name and I, the formal one in the first place?_

" 'Nothing."

"So, Akemi, you remember being a Puella Magi?" Asked Madoka.

"Most of it yes. And I remember having left my home to be on my own. Oh, what date is it?"

"This afternoon was Walpurgis Night"

"Oh yeah. So it's really not another time loop. I don't have a home for now. It would have been here," she made a wide gesture to show the room "but Homura already lives here, and I would only get in the way."

Homura, taking a bite off from her plate: "Agreed."

"You can come to my place." Said Madoka. "It's big and we have a guest room too. And I'm sure my little brother will be super happy to have another onee-chan in the house."

She smiled. "I would love to!"

"But if I may be allowed a word of advice..." Kyubey stepped out of the shadows under the window, meeting the death glare of Homura.

"We don't want you here, you monster."

"Maybe you would like to consider the next girls." said Kyubey, not taking her previous comment into account.

"The next girls?" asked Madoka.

"Yes. I suppose you will try to inverse the process of other witches, am I right?"

"I... guess so. Now that I can save them, I don't want to kill them." Madoka looked at the two Homuras for some advice on this matter.

"So for those next witches, or girls if you prefer, will you take them all in your house? Many, if not all of them won't have anywhere to go back to. What will you do?"

"Kyouko lived on the street fine," started Akemi, "but I can't see myself ask that to any girl we... save."

"And my house can only take so much people." Replied Madoka.

"Orphanage?" Proposed Homura.

"In the same category than living on the street." Akemi answered.

"And then what about school?" Asked Madoka.

"I suppose that would be easier, transferred students are always welcomed."

Kyubey spoke again: "Or they could become Puella Magi again."

This instantly made Homura angry. "If you're going to make such comments, please leave my house."

"Homura, as alien as Kyubey is, he doesn't wish any harm. At least for now." Madoka said, not wanting a new fight to start.

"What, you would allow newly saved girls to make another contract with him?"

"I didn't say that, and I don't think I would, but this possibility does exist and Kyubey just stated that, no more."

Seeing Madoka taking his defense only encouraged him to continue. "This possibility also comes with free wishes, which could solve your problems."

"Oh right, I'm not a Puella Magi anymore." With a blink of regret, Akemi briefly considered that she too was allowed another wish.

"Do you want to become one again?" He asked in his most innocent voice.

Frustrated, Homura stood up and took a handgun from her pocket dimension. "That's it! Leave!"

Kyubey turned around and jumped on the window. "Akemi, you know how to find me." And he disappeared in the night.

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(||—||)

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Later that night, Madoka and Akemi left for the former's house. It had been decided that Akemi will stay there for the time being, and that she won't go to school because of the confusion it would create with Homura. It had also been decided that they will consider what to do about other girls when the next one will appear, and get her opinion in the process. Overall, it was procrastination, and that wouldn't make the problem disappear.

Homura was left alone, alone as she had always been in years. But now history had changed. She finally got her happy ending. Madoka was alive, she herself was too and Walpurgis was not. Hurray! So why did she feel so gloomy about it?

She turned off the lights and let herself fall loudly on her hypermodern bed. She hadn't had a full night sleep in ages, literally. Up until now, all her nights had been spent to steal the army's machinery, grenades and every other thing that blew up, or making plans to kill witches with more efficiency. But now she didn't have to worry about any of that. Walpurgis was — no not dead — no longer a threat, meaning that she could easily kill any witch she would happen to stumble upon. And even though her fight with Walpurgis required her to expend quite a bit of her arsenal, she still had too many guns to count in her shield. So no stress.

But she still was stressed. Flipping on a side, then on the other, she couldn't find any comfortable position on her bed. Under the sheet, then over, then under again. What was wrong with her?

Was it that she had spent so much time feeling nothing but loneliness and sadness that she was now unable to feel anything else beside grief? That for the rest of her life, happiness, joy and innocence will be completely impossible to attain? Nonsense! She had her right to be happy. She had a right to enjoy her time free of deaths with Madoka: to laugh together, to cry together, to worry about mundane things like high school, a scrapped knee or not enough clothes. But no! It wasn't over. It never will, for they were Puella Magis, and couldn't revert back to such a normal life.

But Akemi had such a chance. She, the Homura Akemi that succumb to despair and turned into a witch, won the life that she, the Homura Akemi that fought without showing a shred of weakness and that never gave up, had worked so long to achieve. Why? Why was the world so unfair?

Homura held her pillow tightly close to her. Was she mad at Akemi? Was she mad at _herself_? How low had she fallen to hold such a grudge against someone she knew so well. Herself. Akemi was her, and she was Akemi. So in a way, she too had won that prize through Akemi.

But it didn't make her heart less hollow to think so. And it didn't stop the tears from falling silently on her pillow.

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	2. Chapter 2: Everyone Loves Pet

Chapter 2: Everyone Loves Pet

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The next day, Madoka left early to go to school, leaving Akemi behind. With Tatsuya, Madoka's younger brother, going to kindergarten, and both her parents working full time, the house was soon completely empty. Soon, Akemi was bored.

Madoka's family had shown great hospitality, saying she could stay as long as she liked. They were all so kind, but she still felt like a stranger in this huge house.

Having nothing better to do, she started wandering from room to room, looking to get familiar with the layout of the house. Madoka's room was pink, with a bed full of pillows and stuffed animals situated right under the window and a desk with a computer near the door. The window let in as much sunlight as possible in the morning. It felt good, standing there and feeling the warmth of the still rising sun.

Next, she took a glance of the parents' room. How many _chairs_ where there? She counted twelve, all of high quality and all with a different design. Did Junko have a hobby of collecting good looking chairs? Although all beautiful, some of them looked so uncomfortable she wouldn't dare to try them. They were scattered all around the room, the bed in the middle of it all. There were stairs that went up to an empty platform in the room, and that was it. Kind of plain, except for the chairs...

Tatsuya's room was small compared to the previous two. There was a bed with half as many stuffed animals than Madoka's, but with a bunch of toys scattered in every corner of the room. And the room had seven corners, but weirdly still had a square shape. The middle of the place was clean though.

The bathroom was _humongous_. Hard to imagine that it had only two sink. On the two walls, many graphs and digital windows were left open, showing the fluctuations of many currencies worldwide. Akemi didn't understand a thing of all this, and left.

Last but not least, the kitchen, with enough stored food to feed a whole class of students. It was all flat and square, more so than the average of the house, with an island unit and a table.

And that was it, and Akemi was still bored. She didn't know the passwords for the computers, so she tried the television.

"—yesterday. This strange phenomenon is still unexplained, and the police have started research for the two hundred people that disappeared overnight. The multiple reports also show an abnormal suicide rate on the night of the 30th of April, also known as Wal..."

She immediately jumped on the remote to turn off the digital-wall. No more. She knew she had done terrible things unconsciously, and she was blaming herself for it. And she could stand that, but not if the whole city started to reflect on the event. She didn't want to think about it at all, if possible.

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Having nothing to do in the house, Akemi left for downtown, locking the door behind her with a double of the key Madoka's father gave her earlier. She had nothing in mind when she got down from the bus, and nothing more when she started to wander aimlessly. Even though in this timeline, she just came in town, her memory was filled with witch hunting in most of the streets in the area, so she couldn't get loss even if she tried. Here she fought Suleika, there Charlotte killed Tomoe-san in most timelines, a few kilometers in that direction was the train station where Sayaka died.

There were all those nostalgic memories, but she didn't regret them. They were only the stepping stones to start anew. Akemi could cry Sayaka Miki, and that was ok. She could show respect to Mami Tomoe and praise the courage of Kyoko Sakura. They deserved it, but it shouldn't hamper any of her action in the future. No sorrow.

Now, she had Madoka, and weirdly enough, Homura. She could start a new life from here, make the right choices. Like, for example, should she make another contract with Kyubey or not? Yes, he was an alien energy harvester that used young girls without giving them proper knowledge. Yes, she hated him and his twisted logic. But she had been a Puella Magi for soooo long...

Correction: she had lived the exact same life for pretty long — or was it only a few months? — ; Homura had seen and lived much, much longer than her. This was all new, so of course there was a need to adapt. Akemi could learn to live a normal life again, one where girls don't fight abominations from another dimension, created from fear and despair. Or she could get bored easily, like right now, and start to wonder what she should do of such a life. Perhaps returning to a magical girl's life would be entertaining? Why not, now that there was no Walpurgis Night between her and her goal?

Akemi had walked for some time now, long enough that her stomach started to growl. She tapped her pocket, feeling the cash card of Madoka. When would she start to get independent and stop relying on her? She felt like Madoka was giving her everything she needed, but that she couldn't give back anything.

_That's what friends are for. I only need to be a good friend from now on and some times in the future my turn will come to be helpful._

Back to the present! It was time to eat! She started to feel cramps, both from walking for so long and from hunger. So Akemi stopped at the nearest fast-food and used the credit card, though reluctantly. The miso soup was a good satisfaction, both cheap and tasty.

When she got out, the sun was still high in the sky. Neither Madoka nor Homura will get out of school before a few hours. And she was still bored, so she resumed her walk...

...just to be stopped by some adorable puppies in a glass display out of a pet shop.

"Ooohhhh, how cute!"

Two of them had a bright caramel tone with black fur here and there, making them look like chocolate bars with legs.

"They're for sale if you want."

A young woman, probably in her early twenties, was looking at Akemi from the door of the shop, feeding a baby cat of no more than a few days old with a dropper. It was as adorable as the pups.

"How much?"

"30 000 yens each. But probably less if you're persistent. The manager is kind you know."

Akemi couldn't bring a dog back to Madoka's house, no matter how cute they were. "Thanks, but I'm just looking."

"Do as you please." And she walked back in, feeding another few drops of milk to the kitten.

_This ought to kill my boredom,_ and so Akemi too walked in the store.

There were birds, and balls, and snakes, and beetles, and aquariums, and all sorts of pet, from common to exotic to outright creepy. A crocodile? Really? Oh and what was that!

Akemi was all over the place, looking at everything, touching at everything, dropping... almost everything.

" 'You interested in anything?" It was the same woman as earlier. She had a few boxes of stuff to fill back what had been sold in the day.

"Yeah, almost everything!"

The woman laughs softly. "I'm going to feed the snakes. Do you want to come?"

"Can I? Sure!" She was super excited.

"Don't you have school young lady?" Strangely, she wasn't going toward the snake section.

"No, I don't. And it's boring."

"Why don't you go to school?"

"Ah, hum... eh, hhhmmmm..." _Aaaaarg! Unable to lie! Go to work, brain!_ She started to panic a little. She couldn't really say that her other self was going to school and that two Akemi Homura would be too much.

"Well, it is ok if you don't want to tell me."

Akemi felt embarrassed as hell. _Now she's probably thinking that I skiped school, and that I am such a bad liar._ She punched herself mentally, making a mental note to find a good excuse for next time.

The woman opened a door labeled 'Employees only' and walked trough. Akemi was hesitant to follow her. Maybe she just needed a tool or whatnot to feed the snakes, and she would be right back, so there was no need to go in, right?

A few second of wait and the door opened again, the woman hadn't move. " 'You coming?"

"Yes mam!"

"Please, call me Emi."

"Yes, Emi-sempai!"

"You're cute. What's your name?"

"Akemi."

"Well, Akemi, come here. The mice are waiting."

"Mice?"

"Well, what do you think snakes eat?"

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(||—||)

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The shop was fascinating, and without knowing it she spent two or three hours there before realising the time and forced herself to go home. There were some incidents, most of them going by the lines of: "WHAAAAHHHH, GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF!" or "Come back here you mouse/piglet/bird" or still "COCKROACH INVASION!", but overall, she had a good time. Emi-sempai had the patience of a saint and she was always there to clean up after Akemi and telling her the right way to manipulate baby chameleons or how to hold a gecko without squashing it and lots of other stuff.

It had been such a good experience that Akemi promised to come back the next day so she could learn more about pets and everything.

It had been a good day after all.

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(||—||)

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At school, Madoka and Homura noticed small talk and lots of whispers. Everyone was looking at Madoka with a weird look — was it pity? To add to the unpleasant feeling every one stopped talking as soon as Madoka was close enough to hear their conversations.

"Homura-chan, what's going on?"

She looked around trying to catch a sentence of two. "I don't know."

It all made sense when they entered the classroom. On Sayaka's desk, there was a bouquet of flowers and a big card, probably for everyone to sign. Hitomi broke her conversation and came toward the two girls.

"I'm sorry about Sayaka. She was your best friend and mine, but you knew her better than me. It must have been a greater shock for you when you heard the news."

"Oh, hum. Thanks. I don't really want to think about it right now."

"I understand; if you ever need to talk, I'll always be there for you."

"Thank you Hitomi"

Hitomi then got back to her desk. The class was about to start.

"I had forgotten that Sayaka 'disappeared' a few days ago." she said to Homura. "It seems so far away..." She couldn't help but to feel a bit sad.

"I know. Many things happened meanwhile."

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(||—||)

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The class passed slowly, and when they finally took a break for lunch, she sat with Hitomi, Homura eating two tables away. But the two girls had nothing to say. They just stood there most of the lunch time in silence, but it wasn't awkward. It was making their goodbyes to their lost friend. It was the first time in a while that Madoka could think clearly, without the pressure of Kyubey, or of Sayaka's madness, or of Homura getting killed by the Walpurgis Night. The moment was strangely normal. Even when she was the lone normal girl in a pack of Puella Magi, she didn't felt normal at all. Now she was, and it was kind of soothing.

"I'll go back to class."

"Yeah, me too."

The rest of the day passed as it started. The atmosphere was heavy and nobody put any passion in math equations and literature. Even the teacher, after stumbling on inappropriate puns and jokes, gave up trying to cheer them up and finished class early.

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(||—||)

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"Tonight we go witch hunting."

"I suppose it is one of my new responsibilities as a Puella Magi."

They were walking together, even though Homura's house was in the other direction.

"Do I get to eat supper first?" Asked Madoka.

"You can. I'm more worried about your parents."

"They will let me go if I tell them I'm going for a walk. They might be surprised, but they won't ask questions."

"So it's fine then. I will be waiting by the park, right there. Join me before 8pm."

"Wait, Homura-chan, don't you want to eat with us?"

"Akemi is already at your place, and I still think it isn't good for us to be seen together."

"Well, ok. See ya later."

Stepping in the doorway, Madoka heard a lot of noise trough the door. _What are they doing in there?_

As soon as she got in, Akemi was on her.

"Madoka-chan! Welcome home! I made supper."

Junko poked her head out of the kitchen, cheerfully criticising her plate. "You call _that_ food, Akemi? You really need some lessons."

There was a burnt smell that came floating from the kitchen. "Ahhh! My pastas!" Akemi ran in the kitchen, but wasn't fast enough to prevent the fire alarm from going off.

"Five times. She made the alarm go off five times. Give me my money back Junko." Madoka's dad was sitting at the table, watching the two woman cook and fail. Everything Akemi touched or was in charge of magically turned to ash.

"Geez, you could have a bit more faith in her Tomohisa."

"I have faith. Proof, even if she doesn't improve at all with your tips, I still allow her to use the kitchen."

Madoka came in the fray. "Can I help?"

"Oh, Madoka-chan! You're my savior!"

Her dad turned around to look at her. "Welcome home dear. Your friend is very entertaining."

She laughed. "I hope so. Now let's save those pastas."

.

(||—||)

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After the meal, Akemi and Madoka put their plate in the dishwasher before going outside.

"Mom, dad, I'm going out for a while with Akemi-chan."

"Ok, don't come back too late, though."

"We won't."

They put their shoes and closed the door behind them. Madoka took out her soul gem, holding it in front of her as she had seen her friends do so many times before. "I didn't know you couldn't cook, Akemi-chan." She sounded amused.

Akemi blushed, embarrassed. "I'm no good now, and looking at Homura, I don't think I'll be any good later."

"Homura can't cook either? But she lives alone."

"Instant meals. That's what she served us last night, and that's what I ate when I was on my own before."

"Oh, so that's why."

The park wasn't far away, and they could see the silhouette of Homura-chan under a lamppost. She too was holding her soul gem. "It feels weird to be the only one to not have a soul gem, when I had done this routine for many months." Akemi reflected.

Homura: "You'll get used to it." Then, they got going.

"Maybe we should split to cover a wider area?" Proposed Akemi.

"We should, we won't. It is the first time that Madoka-san goes hunting for witches."

"You know you're talking about the girl that dealt with Walpurgis Night in a single blow?"

Homura frowned. "Madoka-san? What do you want to do?"

Having kept silent during the exchange, Madoka was still pretty unsure of herself for now, and she didn't even consider the entire Walpurgis thing like a real challenge. After all, she only had a single day of expertise. "I would prefer to stick together for now."

They felt silent after that. About thirty minutes later, they felt something far away to the East.

"Madoka-san, feel that?"

"Is that a witch?"

"It's too weak. Maybe it is, or maybe it's a familiar, or just a lone grief seed that didn't transform properly. We should go check."

They transformed and started to run in the direction their soul gem indicated. Akemi had a hard time following them. She tripped a few times, but Madoka was always close to hold her when she did. At some point, Akemi, panting, told her : "Ha...hff...ha, go ahead... ha... hff... I'm slowing... you down...hff..."

" 'You sure?"

"... Yeah... I'll catch up..."

She nodded, and sprinted forward to get back next to Homura. They had both transformed, and were jumping — almost flying — across roofs. It was much faster than by foot, and they were high enough for Akemi to keep track.

Then, without any warning, they were in the witch's labyrinth.

"What the.." Madoka was startled. She had seen many times Mami-sempai or Sayaka dig a hole in the labyrinth without seeing it first, or small open entrances, but this was the first time the labyrinth was all open. In the labyrinth, the witch's presence was way stronger than it was outside.

The familiars started to show themselves. They were _words_, quite literally in fact. This one had 'butcher' for head, and something like '...was arrested near L.A. in a Mustang...' twisted for the body, twitching and crawling around, sometimes serving as legs or other times as threatening arms. Another one had 'broken doll' for what seems to be the head, and again a full sentence for the rest of the body. Some were bigger than others, made of many sentences twisting one around the other into an incomprehensible mangle, or some were smaller, made of onomatopoeias like 'ouch', 'bark' or 'zap'.

Homura made two army Colt 45 appear from nowhere, and discharged them on the familiars nearby, switching to assault rifle when she had enough space. Madoka was using her bow and arrows, shooting ray of light three at a time and never missing.

They frayed there way forward toward the center of the labyrinth, more and more familiars coming at them.

"Is there always this many familiars, Homura-chan?"

"No, but they are just words, so it's no big deal."

"Yeah, but they are _killer_ words."

After a while, the flow of familiars stopped. Intrigued, Madoka exchanged a look with Homura. "No more?" Homura didn't care to answer. She never saw this witch before, so she had no clue what to expect.

In the center of the maze, there was the witch. It was a black diary, with holes for the eyes and the mouth. The holes where moving around, not exactly like eyes but almost like it. The book occasionally opened itself, at which time it seemed like it had two faces. Words were escaping from its pages, condensing into something vaguely reassembling arms.

"Madoka, it's your turn."

"Right." She focussed on her wish, on her own power. She could forgive this witch; she could give her a second chance. She aimed, and shot.

As it had been for Walpurgis, the witch was completely eradicated in a single blow. The labyrinth immediately dissipated and she saw Akemi-chan, looking proudly at her.

The three girls came closer to the place where the witch once stood. There laid the naked body of a very young girl, with short black hair messed up in all directions and the face of a sleeping angel.

The kid was probably no more than six or seven years old.

.

(||/|\||)

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	3. Chapter 3: Newcomer Mitchiko

Chapter 3: Newcomer Mitchiko

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(||\|/||)

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Kyubey looked at the three girls from the shadows. He saw them fight the witch, and he saw Madoka turn her back into a girl. He remembered the kid. But she wasn't of any interest. Madoka, on the other hand...

**Kyubey, an entropic burst of energy has been detected twice in the Mitakihara district. What is the meaning of this?**

"Jyubey, do not worry. I have found a new way to harvest energy."

_What is it Kyubey?_

"So now that I have found another way on my own, Hachibey, you start to talk to me again? May I expect a visit from Sirius shortly?"

_I always have agents on Earth to keep an eye on you two. And need I remember you that you're supposed to reverse entropy, not increase it?_

"You could call that stockpiling. I'm still in the middle of experimentation."

**If you ever try to pull of something suspicious, I won't hesitate to crush you for the sake of the universe.**

"You and what army?" Satisfaction, satisfaction. Kyubey had gained the upper hand against Jyubey. "My trump card here was able to deal with the Walpurgis Night in a single blow."

There was a long silence in the communication.

**WH**_AT_?

"You have been warned. Don't meddle in my business."

And then Kyubey cut the telepathic link with his two counterparts.

.

(||—||)

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"Did any of you two thought about bringing clothes, or a towel maybe?"

Homura and Akemi said no simultaneously. "If this becomes common, we should bring a bag with us at all time."

"But Homura, can't you go to your house and bring some back?" Akemi asked.

She shook her head. "You know, if I walk to my home alone, or if we go together, time will flow the same for me. So why not just go there all together? Besides, none of my shirts fits her." She then took the little girl in her arms and started walking toward her home. Madoka and Akemi exchanged a look, but followed without forcing her.

Her home wasn't that close, although still at a walking distance. It took them more than forty minutes to get there. None of them saw anyone besides cars, so the kid's nudity wasn't as much of an issue as it had been with Akemi, in plain daylight. When they stepped in Homura's bright, only room, the little girl moved in Homura's arms, trying to hide from the light. She was slowly waking up when they put her down on a couch with a blanket.

"What should we do with her now?" asked Madoka.

"Maybe she has parents that are looking for her, or relatives of some kind."

She stood upright on the couch, rubbing her sleepy eyes. "Where am I, desu-ka?"

Akemi sat on her knee to be exactly her height. "You're in a friend's house. I'm Akemi, this pink girl there is Madoka-chan and behind me is Homura-chan. What's your name?"

"Mitchiko Shiori." Only then did she realise that she was very lightly dressed. She wrapped herself in the blanked even more, leaving only the head popping out. "Why don't I have anything on, desu-ka?"

"We found you like this in the street." Homura said, in a low, monotone voice.

Akemi remembered something, got up, walked pass Homura toward a single, specific couch and opened a drawer hidden under it. In it was a sweater that she promptly gave to Mitchiko.

Homura was kind of surprised. "Oh, so that's where I put it last time. But if this keeps on, I won't have anything left for me to wear."

"Don't worry; we'll go shopping for Mitchiko-chan tomorrow." Akemi helped the seven years old putting the sweater on, much too big for her, but still better than nothing. She resumed talking. "Mitchiko-chan, do you remember why you were in the middle of the streets, at night?" Akemi was aware that she herself did not remember anything in her first few minutes of consciousness, so she knew it would be no good to ask her about Puella Magi or witches.

"I don't know, nee-chan." She was skeptical. "Was I really naked, in a street, at night like you say, or did you kidnapped me and want me to believe this, desu-ka?" She was making big eyes, half scared and half excited of living an adventure.

Akemi and Madoka laugh, Homura kept her cool. "We're not kidnappers. You can stay here for the night,..."

"..." Homura was about to contest this decision, but then changed her mind. Anyway, it was too dark to bring her anywhere else, even if she had a relative.

"..., and tomorrow, we'll go get you some fitting clothes, and you'll tell me where you live, okay?" Akemi was good with kids, Madoka reflected.

"Okay, nee-chan!"

"Good. Madoka, it's getting late, we should return to your home. Homura, at what time do you leave for school?"

"Seven thirty."

"So I'll be there by then. Good night you two. Mitchiko-chan."

The two left, leaving Homura alone with Mitchiko. _How will I take care of this child?_ Homura didn't think very highly of her skills in babysitting. She may have had some in the past — probably, since Akemi was taking all this smoothly — but lost it when she started to distance herself emotionally from Madoka's group, so as not to be affected by the grief of constant deaths.

"It is late, Mitchiko Shiori. You should go to sleep."

"I'm not sleepy, desu."

"You'll be when I turn off the lights."

That's exactly what she did before changing to pyjamas and going in her own bed. She wasn't sure she could sleep this early — two AM was her normal schedule — but she didn't care, as long as she didn't have to do babysitting duty.

"I'm still no sleepy."

_What an arrogant little girl_. Homura though. She listens perfectly to everything Akemi said, but will give her a hard time? Oh no you won't.

"Maybe you're not, but I have school tomorrow." She left out the fact that she didn't actually need much sleep to go to school, but that was a detail.

There wasn't any response. _Maybe she understood and made an effort to keep quiet. Good for her._

Suddenly, Homura's bedspread flew to the ground, forcefully pulled by an angry Mitchiko.

"I want to do something, desu!"

_This is going to be a looong night._

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(||—||)

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The next morning, Madoka and Akemi left early to make the detour to Homura's house before school time. They rang. There was running foot step, and then the door flew open.

"Take her." Homura's hair was in a critical state, and her school uniform was crumpled. She pushed Akemi into the house. "You know where the keys are. Lock before you leave." Homura then, closed the door as fast as she could.

"Homura-chan?"

"What a pest. Let's go Madoka-san."

"Did something happen with Mitchiko-chan?"

"Don't want to talk about it." She passed a hand in her hair as they walked, trying to get rid of her many knots and also trying to arrange her uniform; no good. She still looked like she has been attacked by a dog.

And she left her hairbrush in the house. What a mess

.

(||—||)

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Akemi was looking at the door Homura just slammed. She seemed _really_ angry. Turning to Mitchiko, who was looking from the top of the stairs, she asked: "What happened between you two?"

"Meany nee-chan is meany, desu."

She was still wearing the same sweater as yesterday, but she now also had a dress. "How does this stays in place?" Akemi walked up the stairs to look at the dress, and finally found a rubber band that tucked all the excess tissue in the dress. Not really elegant, but it worked.

"I hope it'll last until we buy something for you. Don't move around too much or it'll fall."

"Okay, nee-chan."

"Are you ready to go? You had breakfast?"

"Yes! We can go shopping, desu!"

"Ok, so here we go." Akemi took the double of the key that she and Homura always kept in the drawer of the table, and they left for the mall. It was still early, but if they take their time and walked to it, they will arrive at the opening.

Locking the door behind her, Akemi saw Kyubey standing on the grass beside her. Mitchiko didn't seem to realize he was there.

"Kyubey?"

Mitchiko turned to Akemi. "Kyubey, hu? That sounds familiar, desu..."

"Should I make myself visible to her, or do you want to keep her out of any Puella Magi business?"

_What do you want?_ Akemi resorted to though talk.

"I just want to watch over the two miracles of Madoka."

_Fine, but don't make any move on Mitchiko-chan. _

"I won't."

With that, they started to walk, an invisible Kyubey keeping a respectable distance between him and the two girls. Reassured that Kyubey will keep quiet, Akemi calmed down and started her interrogatory on Mitchiko's past.

"Mitchiko-chan, where do you live"

"Oh, I know my address!" She told Akemi her address. She was proud that she could give it without making any mistake in it.

Akemi never heard of the street Mitchiko mentioned. She though she knew Mitakihara well, but maybe there was still corners of the big city she never explored. _Kyubey, do you know where her place is?_

"Yes, I have agents covering the whole city. I know that place."

_Is it close from here?_

"Not really. It would be faster in bus. It's in the south part of Mitakihara, in the residential ward."

Finally, Kyubey's presence could prove useful after all. "Can you tell me what it looks like?"

Mitchiko started to describe her house, both her loving parents that are 'the best parents in the world', her dog Beauty that she missed a lot, the neighborhoods and everything she could remember of her place. She was energetic and very talkative. Sometimes, she pulled a word or two that Akemi didn't understand, things like her mother being a 'nelipot', or that her dog was so fluffy that she always felt 'knismetis'.

"Mitchiko-chan, where did you learn those words?"

"I read them, of course, desu!"

Finally arrived at the mall, they looked in every store that featured clothes for kids. They tried many colors and styles, laughing and chatting about which looked good and which looked awful. With her black messy hair, Mitchiko looked best in black and white outfits, or dark blue ones. They bought three different set of clothes: a white shirt with a black skirt and stripped socks, a blue shirt with jean shorts and a dress in the same tones. They also bought a sweater, a few pairs of socks and panties. She wore the dress immediately. All set to take on the world, they left with lots of bags in their hands, one of which had Homura's stuff.

"I want to make a small detour before we go to your home. There is a friend I promised to meet today."

They then took the bus and went to say hello to Emi, the pet shop keeper. They left the shop two hours later, time flying by when you have so much fun.

.

(||—||)

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_Ok, Kyubey, can you guide me to her place now?_

"Sure can. You don't have any other detour to make beforehand?"

_No, we're all set now. _

They took the bus that went to the residential ward, and got off when Kyubey told them. They had to walk a small distance, but as they came closer and closer to their destination, Mitchiko became more and more excited to see her parents and her dog again.

Finally, they reached it. It was a small house, more traditional than Madoka's on the outside. It was build of red bricks, with a minimum of windows, a garage on the side and the possibility of a small backyard; although from the street it was hard to tell. There was no car visible in the entrance. Maybe it was in the garage?

Mitchiko ran to the door, put a hand under a flower pot near it and took a hidden key. The door opened, creaking.

The inside of the house was completely empty. Trying the switch, Akemi notice the electricity was off. Nobody seemed to live here anymore.

"Mom! Dad! Beauty! Where are you desu-ka?" Mitchiko was worried. "Where is everything, desu-ka?" She started to look in the rooms, searching for anything that was left behind.

"The house has been abandoned two years ago."

_How do you know? _

"She was a Puella Magi. She made a contract with me, so it's only natural that I remember her."

_She turned into a witch two years ago?_

"Yes."

_What happened?_

"That, I do..."

There was a scream in the house, coming from the kitchen. Akemi hurried to get there. Mitchiko was looking at a large black patch of dry blood on the floor. Well, there were dry patches of blood everywhere: on the walls, on the table and on the furniture, but the one on the ground was the most impressive. She was mumbling to herself: "nail, mom, dad, nail, mom..."

"Mitchiko-chan, what happened?"

The little girl started to cry in Akemi's arms. "They're dead! I remember; they're both dead!"

"How?" She tried to sound calm and strong to reassure Mitchiko.

"A witch, *sob*, a witch made them kill themselves, desu." She cried for a few minutes before she was able to talk again. Akemi held her tight, saying soothing things in her ears to calm her. After a while, she was strong enough to resume talking. "They ate nails, and tried to make me eat some too, desu. *sob*. Mom looked so scary..."

"Shhh, it's alright now."

"They were spitting out,..."

"Shhhh, it's over. Come, we're going home."

They left, the mood as low as humanly possible. Neither of them talked much during the ride to Homura's house. When they got to it, it was already sunset and they were both exhausted. They rang.

Homura opened the door. She immediately saw that something went wrong, but she didn't ask any questions. She helped them load their stuff up the stairs, and organised a corner around Mitchiko's couch for her.

"Mitchiko Shiori, do you need anything else?"

"I want to sleep, desu."

Homura tucked up comfortably the kid with the blanket, and turned off the lights to allow her to sleep. She and Akemi went outside to talk.

She learned the full story.

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(||—||)

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"Homura-chan, this has been a long day for me too. I'm tiered. I'll just go to Madoka's place and sleep."

"It's fine. I can take care of Madoka-san on my own for the hunt."

"But can you also take care of Mitchiko-chan? She needs support right now."

"I'll try. Thanks Akemi-san."

She was surprised. "For what?"

"For dealing with all that for the four of us."

"Well, you're welcome. Good night."

And she left.

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(||—||)

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Madoka and Homura were out hunting for a few hours, but there was no witch that night. Madoka was brought up to date concerning Mitchiko, and she said she wanted to help. The week-end was coming shortly, and then they will be able to hang together a bit more, and get to know their new addition to the group. But until then, Madoka would be worrying over the little girl, despite Homura telling her Akemi was in control of it all.

Kyubey was still watching, hidden in the shadows. He remembered it all: when Mitchiko wished to be able to read and write easily, when she started to hunt witches under his instructions, when two weeks later she came back from school only to see that a witch had targeted her own family, and later that night, after she killed the witch, that she had turned into one herself. He was curious where the grief had gone to when she turned back to a human being. Now, he started to believe it didn't change at all; that little girl still had the same potential as a Puella Magi as she did two year ago.

The little white alien grinned of its everlasting cat smile. The harvest was going to be good. He just needed to be patient.

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(||/|\||)

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	4. Chapter 4: Support Means Everything

Chapter 4: Support Means Everything

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It was another night of hunting. The four girls were out, Madoka and Homura fighting while Akemi and Mitchiko were watching. Mitchiko had specifically asked to participate to the hunt after she regained her memory, so she was given the important role of holding the bag of skirts, shirts and long robes prepared specifically for the witch-turning-into-girl event. Since the incident at her house, she didn't mention anything regarding her past, and no one dared talk about it either. Instead, most of her energy was spent inquiring what she called 'top secret information' on the group and catching up with the Walpurgis Night/time travel/doppelganger thing that was going on. She didn't understand half of it, but she still found the story fascinating.

Back to the hunt, they were in a barrier made of flat flames' pictures coming from the top of the labyrinth, its flames defying gravity by pointing downward. The temperature was hotter than the outside world, but not as hot as it would have been with real flames; simply as uncomfortable as a very hot and dry day of summer. Akemi and Mitchiko were just on the outer perimeter of the barrier, yet they were already sweating heavily. Mitchiko was trying to distract herself from the heat by singing something with water: "She sells sea-shells on the sea-shore. The shells she sells are sea-shells, I'm sure..."

At the center of the witch's labyrinth, the temperature was exceeding over 130o Fahrenheit, dangerously high for any but Puella Magis. The two magical girls had a really hard time focusing on the fight, thirst and exhaustion dragging and slowing them down. The witch's body was also made of flame, giving it camouflage in its favorite terrain. It was maliciously taking its time knowing the heat itself was hampering its opponent's movement more and more by the minute. Madoka was shooting it arrows again and again, but the witch was smart. It was throwing decoys, familiars, to take the shots while it continued hiding its presence.

Homura's patience had reached its limit. "Madoka, I'll try to blast the whole area. Aim for the witch."

"Don't hurt her!"

Homura noded and then proceeded to place trigger bombs on strategic places, doing as fast as she could to prevent the heat from activating the bombs before she would pulled the trigger.

There was a huge explosion. Debris and dust filled the air, blocking Madoka's line of sight to the witch. "Homura-chan?"

There was another explosion, this time a simple pressure bomb. The choc wave pushed the dust and debris away, and it almost made Madoka lose her balance. The witch was in clear sight now, in the middle of an empty space where flames stood earlier.

"Madoka-san! Your turn!"

She aimed. She shot. The barrier crumbled.

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(||—||)

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"Pfew, finally! I can breathe!" Akemi said. She jogged to reach Homura and Madoka, both of them catching their breath on the ground.

"Wait for me, desu!"

The girl in the middle of them four was a red headed girl in her late sixteen, quite old for a former Puella Magi.

"Mitchiko-chan," asked Madoka, "I think only my mother's dress will fit her."

"Right away, nee-san!" She pulled a plain old green robe and gave it to Madoka.

Before they could dress the new girl up, she woke up and sat. "Kyubey..." she said in an angry voice.

"Wow! She's already up! And she remembers Kyubey."

"Where's Kyubey?" She was clearly confused. She tried to stand up, but she was still unstable on her feet and scratched herself on the concrete while trying. "Where am I?"

"Careful." Akemi and Madoka both came closer to help her, the latter of which holding the robe. "You're in Mitakihara. Here, dress yourself."

Redhead looked at the cloth, disgusted by the color, but still put it on.

Homura came closer. "What's your name?"

"None of your business."

She was now able to stand on her own. She was tall, almost an adult and certainly was at least a head taller than the other four girls. Homura and Madoka had just changed back from their magical girl outfits, under the suspicious glare of the newcomer.

"You're Puella Magis, huh?"

"Yes."

She then noticed the resemblance between the two Homuras, and asked: "Are you two twins or something?"

"None of your business." replied Homura, as aggressively as redhead as been in her first reply.

"You're right." She turned around and started to walk toward the shadows of the street. "My business is with Kyubey."

"What do you want with him?"

"Isn't it obvious?" she asked with a sadistic smile, "I want to kick his ugly butt."

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(||—||)

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She left in the dark street, knowing the little alien would be somewhere close. He always was close.

"Kyubey. Show yourself."

"Why, long time no seen, Hotaru Masami." Kyubey was still in the cover of the shadows, only visible as a dark silhouette with blood-red eyes.

"Yeah right. It's only been a day you pulled your trick on me!"

"Actually, it's been more than a few months."

"Whatever, I don't care, a day or a month. All that matters now is beating you to a pulp." She clapped her fingers once. Nothing happened. Frustrated, she clapped them twice and three times, bearing no results.

"You're not a Puella Magi anymore. You would have learned that much if you only took the time to listen to Madoka."

Surprised, she asked: "I'm...human? I'm a shity little human again?"

"Madoka, the girl in pink, wished to be able to bring back witches to their former human selves."

Masami seemed to consider this for a while, but finally decided that it didn't matter. "If I'm a human now, that means that I can become a Puella Magi again, huh? And that I have another wish?"

"You're pretty old to be turned, and you were already a Puella Magi for five years."

"That's not an answer."

Kyubey paused, wondering at what age a girl stopped feeling negative emotions. Masami was pretty wild, even for a teenager. "I guess I could make an exception for you."

"Okay, then. Let's make a contract. I wish to be able to kick your ass whenever I feel like it."

"I'm not sure to like this wish."

"That's exactly why I'm doing it." She smiled again of the same sadistic smile she gave to Homura. This little guy deserved everything she was going to give to him that night.

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(||—||)

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"So she left, just like that." Madoka said, thoughtful. She wasn't sure if she was supposed to run up to her and offer her hospitality, or if she should be glad she didn't have to.

"Let her be." Homura was still tense of her confrontation with the older girl. That was one redhead she will stay away from if possible. "She seems to know what she's doing."

"But if she doesn't have any shelter?"

"It stopped being our problem the moment she left." Homura started to walk back in the direction of her home, but Madoka stopped her.

"You mean we fought hard to save that girl, and now we will just throw everything away and dump her in the middle of nowhere without knowing if she has a home?"

Homura looked at Madoka strait in the eyes, angry and intimidating. "I'm not getting close to this girl if I can help it. And I forbid you to talk to her again! She's not part of the group and never will!" She then walked away, passing by Madoka as if she didn't exist anymore.

The tension in the air was unbearable. It was the first time Homura lost her cool in front of Madoka. Homura, that was usually so protective and caring toward the pink girl, talking to her like that... It made Madoka cry silently. She couldn't know that uncertainty of this new timeline was taking its toll on Homura, usually so adamant and sure of herself. Since Walpurgis, the purple girl had been acting blindly, and stress was creeping around her soul, slowly building up with each passing day.

Not adding anything, Madoka resolved herself to get back to her own bed. Akemi and Mitchiko could only watch as the scene unfolded itself. Has Homura always been like this, or was it this new girl? Akemi reflected that the new girl couldn't be the cause of this. Was it that the grief in their soul gem was building up? But then what could she and Mitchiko do besides watching? Even though they were in the middle of it all, they were only spectators and the world of magical girls seemed further and further from their reach. And that world was only filled with sadness.

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(||—||)

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The next day, Akemi was depressed, and because she was, Mitchiko also felt low. Homura and Madoka had left early for school, as always. It was always the same thing, always Homura that spent more time with Madoka. They were together at school, they were together during witch hunting, and Akemi was with Madoka only from bedtime to sunrise. There wasn't much to do beside sleeping when they were alone together; no playing, no shopping, nothing.

But this was only half of the reason why she was feeling depressed; the other half being that Madoka's relation with Homura was still tense from the previous night. They didn't exchange greetings of any sort when Homura showed at the door, and they left as if it was torture to walk beside each other. She wanted to help, to be there for both of them and cheer them up, but now they were gone and she couldn't. And her head was filled with nothing but sad thoughts. Maybe going to the pet shop would somehow help? Akemi was spending most of her days there, often with Mitchiko, but sometimes alone. Today, she really needed to speak to someone, but the kid also needed to get out from Homura's room. What should she do?

They took the bus, and spent time chatting about anything but magical stuff, until they arrived at the pet shop. At the pet shop, Akemi tried to be as enthusiastic and curious as she was the first time around, not for herself but so that Mitchiko could forget her worries for a while. And it worked. Kids were so easily distracted.

She left Mitchiko by the aquariums and searched for Emi. The shop assistant was in the butterfly net, a big room with nets on the walls and ceiling filled with nothing but pretty flowers and brightly colored butterflies. The air was kept humid to allow some exotic flowers to bloom here.

"Emi-sempai." Said Akemi, as a form of greeting. She wasn't in the mood of saying 'good morning'.

"Oh, hi Akemi-san. You came today too? Is your friend with you?"

"Mitchiko is looking at the fishes." She didn't know how to ask for help. She needed to talk to someone, that much she was sure, but now that Emi was in front of her, she found nothing to say. What could she say when her problems revolved mainly around magical stuff and the relationship between her double and her best friend?

"Don't just stand there. Come here!"Akemi obliged. "Give me your hand."

Emi had an orange slice in her hand and gently pressed a single drop of pure orange juice on the back of Akemi's hand.

"Now, don't move."

Akemi didn't know what Emi was trying to pull, but seeing that her mentor had almost stopped breathing, she didn't dare to move either. In the first few seconds, nothing happened. Akemi started to have some doubts on the sanity of Emi's actions, but then a butterfly flew in her direction, danced around her hand and posed itself on it, sucking the small drop of juice. As soon as its trunk touched the drop, many other butterflies came her way, as if they were waiting only for one of them to make the first step to rush on the drop of sunshine. Soon, her hand disappeared under a dozen pairs of wings of the colors of the rainbow. It tickled, but Akemi was able to keep still in fear of breaking this beautiful mosaic. When the drop had completely disappeared, the butterflies started to leave one by one. The last one was a tiny being with purple wings graced with small diamond shapes on the tips. And this one left too.

"Wow!"

"Amazing, isn't it?"

"Sure is! Can you do it again?"

"Of course." Emi smiled. She had an idea. She held the piece of orange, but instead of pressing it against Akemi's hand she went behind the girl, pulled her braids on the side and put a drop on the back of her neck. Akemi froze, not wanting the juice to run down her back. There was a small wait and then she felt it. A very light pressure tickling the back of her neck, moving up and down and poking around her skin, as if the tip of her hair had decided to feed on the orange drop instead of butterflies. Then there was a second one, a gentle breeze of air as it delicately landed on her skin. Then, a third one, and a fourth. There started to have too many for the small square of exposed skin, but they kept coming. The sensations began to spread, up as a light caress on her hair and down as if her shirt was being knit on her. Then it was over, and the butterflies flew away, making Akemi shiver one last time under the breath of their wings.

"Thanks, Emi-sempai."

"You don't have to thanks me for that."

"No, it's just that I felt a little down before coming here, so thanks for cheering me up."

Emi looked at Akemi, something like motherly affection in her eyes. "You know, when you're sad, you don't think as clearly as you would normally." She settled down the quarter of orange on a rock and watched as the little beauties landed around it. "You need to smile once in a while to keep your head strait." She looked back at Akemi. "Is your head clean enough to talk about what's bothering you?"

"It's about my friend and,... my sister." A little lie wouldn't hurt, shall it?

Emi didn't say a word, encouraging Akemi to talk.

"It's complicated. I used to pass a lot of time with my best friend, but lately she's been more and more with my sister, and...I feel lonely." Strangely, she felt like she succeed in asserting the problem so simply while a few hours ago it all looked like a big mess. Maybe she really did need to take some distance in order to admit the facts. Emi was doing magic in her own way.

"How is that complicated?"

Akemi shrugged. "We're... twins. She,.. no, I came in her life only a while ago, but we both knew the same girl for a really long time and that girl is the best friend of each of us."

"And so now you're feeling jealous that she spends most of her time with your twin instead of you." completed Emi. Akemi nodded, ashamed that her situation, put so bluntly, seemed really immature. "Why don't you just join in with them and spend time together all three of you?"

_Because they are magical girls with heavy responsibilities; that joining the 'group' condemns you to become one day a monstrosity that will kill people and that by some luck of fate I was given the chance to make my choice again?_ "Because my sister doesn't want me to." That was for the school part, and possibly a bit of the magical part as well.

"Who is she to tell you what you should or shouldn't do? Think for yourself. Do you want to be with them?"

"Yes." She did want to be with Madoka more than anything else. "But I can't replace my sister."

"You don't have to. You just need to be as important for your friend as your sister is for her right now. Everyone's special; you probably heard it before but it's a valuable truth. In what are you special? What can you do that your sister can't?"

Akemi didn't know. Everything she could do, Homura could too and possibly be better than her at it. School grades? Check. Athletic performances? Check. Was a valuable ally against witched? Check. Return in time to save one's friend without losing all hope? Check, check and check. She was normal, Homura was magical. She was clumsy and weak, Homura was cool and strong. And the list goes on.

This looked grim for her. Was there any chance of being better than Homura in anything? Just at this moment, seeing that she couldn't find anything by herself, Emi placed the orange slice in her hand. What can you do that your sister can't? She can call butterflies, feed snakes, hold lizards and take care of pets of all kind. She was delicate and affectionate, something Homura was not. She could take care of herself and of Mitchiko. So why couldn't she take care of Madoka as well? Because she wasn't given the chance, but that was easy to fix. But was she ready to live with the consequences? Was she ready to leave a peaceful life to dabble in the realm of darkness and magic? _What peaceful life?_ She thought. _My life stopped being peaceful the day I first met Madoka, and I won't be able to stay with Madoka if I keep this 'peaceful life'_.

She had a new resolve. From now on, she would be taking care of Madoka as best as she could.

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(||—||)

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Mitchiko had been looking at the starfish and crabs for some time before she got bored and started looking for Akemi.

"Nee-chan! Where are you desu-ka?"

She walked in the alley of the store, looking for her friend and guardian, but couldn't find her anywhere. She started to panic a little, looking at her left, looking at her right and seeing nothing but animals and animal stuff from her small height. Was she alone? Did Akemi left without her? And her that believed Akemi to be her best friend, but no she took the first occasion to dump her in the middle of nowhere! Ok, calm down. She could have gone to the bathroom or went to check another part of the store.

But what if... What if she really was alone? She would pass the rest of her days in a pet shop, eating dog food and sleeping on the floor like an animal. She didn't want that; she was no animal.

So she started to run. "Akemi-nee-chan! Nee-chan!"

"Are you lost?"

She turned to see who was her savior; was it the one that would take her away from this animal life she was destined to, or the one that would find Akemi for her, or just some passerby talking to her that wouldn't help in anyway? It was none of that. In the direction the voice came was a small white cat with red eyes and long ears, which had a kind of floating ring around them.

"Kyubey?"

Kyubey moved its tail around. "Do you want to find Akemi?"

"You know where she is?"

"I just arrived." said Kyubey, eluding the question."But there is an easy way to get to her, you know."

"What is it?"

Kyubey paused. "You know what it is."

"Making a contract?"

He jumped to the ground, just in front of her feet and looked up. "That is a possibility. You know enough about Puella Magi. You don't need me to warn you of anything. You're a big girl, now."

She hesitated, remembering what happened last time. The witch, her parents, blankness. She didn't want to relive this, but on the other hand she didn't want to be left alone in this shop forever. Could she trust Kyubey?

"Kyubey! Go away from Mitchiko!" Akemi shouted from the end of the alley. She ran to place herself between Mitchiko and the alien. Leave! Now!

He obliged, knowing the time will come eventually for him to grant the wish of one of those two. Grief for those two was growing stronger by the day, he could feel it. On the other hand, Homura and Madoka; their despair to them was growing stronger by the _hour_. Soon he could appreciate the delicious sight of a witch's transformation. Or two...

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(||/|\||)

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First of all, thank you for your reviews and your support. They are greatly appreciate.

Next, I made minor changes to the other three chapters, replacing '...' by '(||/|\||)', adding space between sections and corecting small mistakes that whent unoticed on my part the first time around. I'm not a native english writer, so if I misuse some synthax structure, please tell me my mistake.

A note on this chapter: This is the beginning. From here on out, the story will get a lot darker and edgier. You got a glimpse in the 3rd chapter, but the real descent in madness starts now.


	5. Chapter 5: Death Strikes Twice

Warning: This chapter introduces characters from the spin-off 'Puella Magi Kazumi Magica'. It may contain spoilers of the manga, which is really good if you didn't read it yet. I encourage you to go read it, although my fiction can also be read without prior knowledge. It also supposes the resolution of the conflict with Kanna Hijiri as if it ended at chapter 19; which means that Kazumi Kaoru and Umika are still alive and unaware of Kyubey's existence.

With that said, good reading.

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Chapter 5: Death Strikes Twice

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Kazumi was making supper for her two friends and herself. It was that secret recipe she inherited from her dying grandma, one she knew everyone loved.

The door opened. "Hummmm! Smells like strawberry risotto!" Kaoru Maki, an athletic and energetic girl with short blond hair, reached her finger in the pot, tasting the delicious rice.

"Hey! No cheating Kaoru!"

"What's the occasion for strawberry risotto?" This was Umika Misaki, the third girl of their group. She was the head of the three and came with the serious look of an analyst under the frame of her glasses, although the glasses were only for reading and for the looks.

Kazumi pulled the rice away from the fire. "Well, it's been a full week since we dealt with Kanna Hijiri, and nothing bad happened. Isn't that enough to celebrate?"

"I think you were just going through a strawberry-risotto withdrawal." Umika said, smiling as she teased her friend.

Kazumi made a face at Umika. "As if you were not in need for some too!"

"Okay girls. Let's get addicted shall we?"

They settled to eat and within minutes, the whole plate was gone. When it came to strawberry risotto, all three were real gluttons. When they were finished and had talked a bit of their respective days, they took the plates to the dishwasher. It was then that they noticed that someone was watching them from the window.

"Bey-chan?" Kazumi exclaimed, happy to see another one of her friends.

"Not exactly."

Kazumi stopped in her furry to hug the little cat-like alien. He did look different. He still had the same ears and head with the fluffy ring of fur around his neck, but the rest of his body was white, except for a small circle on his belly which was black. Kazumi remembered Jyubey fully black, not white.

"You're not?"

"Well, I am Jyubey if that was the meaning of your question, but the one you called Bey-chan is not me. He became an entity in his own right the day Umika Misaki brainwashed him." As they recalled this event, Umika and Kaoru became grim and serious. Umika had used her memory magic on Jyubey to make him forget his previous goals and gain him to their side. They had a good reason to do it at the time, since before Jyubey was manipulating the whole Pleiades to his own advantage. Seeing that the two girls did not welcome his presence as much as Kazumi, Jyubey added: "Oh, and don't try to pull that off again. It seems, as the last attempt showed, that emotions are fatal for these bodies of mine. The only reason I did not immediately remove the existence of the entity Bey-chan was because you Pleiades were not of a real concern."

"Were you watching us from our Jyubey's point of view all this time?" Kazumi asked, curious.

"No, I was watching you myself from afar. Showing myself while you were under the guard of an incubator, as sick as he was, would have been of no avail."

"Then why do you show yourself now?" Kaoru was still on her guard.

"For many reasons. First of all, to fulfill my role of guardian of Puella Magi; second of all, you have a tremendous amount of grief seeds that I would like to collect in the near future;…"

Since the event with Kanna Hijiri, they somehow managed to destroy every witch that had awakened that very day, and they took every single grief seed they could. Without Jyubey's cleaning of their soul gem, they needed to rely solely on grief seeds. All in all, they had collected over thirty seeds, and they were using them very sparingly.

"… and finally, I need your help."

The three girls did not expect that last one. They were quite surprised; as long as they could remember Jyubey, good or bad, had only had the role of watcher. To think that he could have problems of some sort… was completely out of their mind.

"What is it?"

"My colleague is doing something very wrong in his work."

"By colleague you mean another fairy like you?"

"Yes, he is called Kyubey. He's the former generation of Incubator." He pause to let the information sink in.

"And what is the problem?"

"I need to see what he is up to, but I am afraid he will be protected by powerful Puella Magis." Jyubey thought back at what Kyubey told him: a single girl able to defeat the strongest witch in existence; powerful indeed. "In order to get close to him I will need an escort."

"An escort, huh?" Umika was thinking very fast, arguing in her head if they should help or not. She wasn't convinced yet. "Where do we need to escort you?"

"To Matikihara Town."

"Hey, Umika, it's fairly close from Asurano city!" Kazumi was kind of excited; not that the last few days were outright boring. Since everything calmed down, Kazumi made peace with herself and had grief over the loss of the other four members of the Pleiades. But now Kaoru was training for soccer a lot, Umika was writing another novel and Kazumi… was bored.

"I'm still not convinced. What is he doing that's so wrong?"

Jyubey blinked. "I don't know. That's why I want to go check."

"If you don't know what he's doing, how can you know he's doing it wrong?" Umika was unstoppable now; she needed answers.

"Our job is to reverse entropy, or put simply, create energy. I detected Kyubey increasing entropy, or stealing energy. I don't know how or why, but this could become a danger."

"A danger?"

"Where do you think he takes that energy he's stealing?"

And then Umika was out of questions. Jyubey had a point. What was really going on out there?

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(||—||)

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The girl was at the top of one of the numerous skyscrapers of the city. The wind was gushing, pushing her in the back as if encouraging her to make that fatal step to her doom. She was on the edge; she had been on the edge for many weeks but never had the resolve to kill herself, never found that all hope was lost. But today it was. Today nothing could get any worse, and what she considered the worst had dramatically changed in a single day.

Her whole family had disappeared! Vanished, gone, as if they had never existed in the first place. All she could remember was a lucid dream, way too lucid for her taste, where all of her relatives were being eaten alive, one by one. And even though she woke up in her bed the next morning, the house was empty and she knew that this was more than a dream. She had no friends, no relatives, no one to turn to anymore. Her already miserable life, one she already considered throwing away, became overnight a real hell where death was the only salvation.

She was ready to jump.

"If you were granted a single wish, what would it be?" asked Kyubey.

She turned to see the intruder. She didn't felt surprise, nor fear or doubt or anything. She didn't need emotion anymore, on the brink of death. But the fact that it was no human was relieving. She didn't want to explain her reasoning any more than she wanted to live, and a human being would have tried to stop her by any means.

"I don't care anymore."

"Are you sure? Because I can grant one for you."

"You can?" Kyubey nodded. "Then I wish to not remember my family, neither this awful dream in which they are killed."

A few seconds later, she was holding a gem in her hand. She still felt all empty inside, but she didn't know why anymore.

"What is this?"

"This is your soul. I extracted it from your body so you won't die no matter what. It is you yourself."

She looked at her soul, an egg shaped gem, and she was completely disgusted. Her soul, everything that made her the one she was, not in her anymore. "My soul? Then what about this body? What am I?"

"You're just a walking puppet that your soul takes control of temporarily."

She looked more and more frighten. What was this thing talking about? She was a puppet? "Why? Why did you do this?"

"So you could fight for the rest of your life at my service without dying from injuries of course."

This was getting worse and worse. She wanted to get away, but she was on the edge of the roof. She couldn't put any more distance between her and the incubator than she already had. "I'm… your slave?"

"In a way, yes. From now on, you will fight monstrosities called witches that are just other girls like you that made the same contract with me…"

"Stop… get away from me!"

"Obviously, you will also turn one day into one of those monstrosities I'm talking about and you will start to feed on the souls of humans."

"Stop! Stop! STOP!"

She couldn't bear any of this anymore. She threw the gem as far away in the empty space as she could; thinking this object was the cause of all of her misfortune. Two seconds later she blanked out and fell from the skyscraper.

Kyubey looked from the height her body getting broken on the concrete and soon a small group of person that were attracted by the unusual event. This trick never got old, he thought. Such weak souls didn't deserve to be treated carefully. They were only any good as witches.

Speaking of which, he got another of his body look out the place where the soul gem fell. This girl wasn't dead. As long as her soul gem existed, she would too. She would exist as a conscience without any body, without any means of speech or senses of any kind, without even the luxury to dream or to fade away from the empty black void they were put in. And slowly, like the seeds of a tree, these soul gems would darken, and later transform into grief seeds. Every so called 'dead Puella Magi' always left behind a soul gem that eventually became a witch.

The lone soul gems were everywhere. They were moved around by curious animals and cars and rivers and drains and peoples that happened to find them. Mitakihara was quite the place to produce such an abundant number of young girl suicides. It was really convenient.

However there was one soul gem Kyubey was eager to see blooming. He was attending to it every day, and now it was ready. The soul was no more.

The gem suddenly exploded in a circle of crystallized grief, letting pictures and memories and personality spread out in all directions to form its own labyrinth. The space around it started to warp impossibly. Minions escaped from the hole of oblivion, new versions of that forgotten self that had been the magical girl. Matter started to flow out from the grief seed, forming the flying mass of the witch. When all was finished, the fully fledged witch was hungry. Unbearably hungry.

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(||—||)

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Hotaru Masami noticed the change. A witch had appeared. She left the Kyubey she was casually torturing and changed to her magical girl outfit. She gave one last look at the alley she had settled in; three dead bodies of the pesky alien and the fourth one missing a leg. It was as good a distraction as any other, but now the witch took priority. She left the alley and headed for the part of the city where the aura came from.

As soon as she had left, multiples of Kyubey came in the alley where the three dead bodies laid. "What a waste." He said, before eating the other four, not leaving a single piece left on the floor

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(||—||)

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Homura and Madoka both immediately felt the witch's presence. It was strong, and close. It was past noon and they were at school. The diner break would end soon, but that didn't matter anymore. This wasn't good.

"Madoka-san, we're leaving."

Madoka nodded, not adding a word. She was still angry at Homura from the other night, but she tried to push those problems aside and concentrate on the fight to come.

She didn't see Homura take out her gem, mostly black, and didn't hear her cursing under her breath.

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When Akemi and Mitchiko left the pet shop, they spotted a red dot in the far away sky jumping from roof to roof, heading north.

"Is that redhead, desu-ka?"

"Yes, it is." Akemi looked closer. She really seemed like she was in a hurry, and she wasn't carefully hiding her presence. Anyone could see her. Was it a witch? But where was she going exactly? Then, she saw her jump down to the ground and enters a building. A hospital.

"Mitchiko-chan."

"Hum?"

"Let's hurry and go check." Akemi remembered the place. She went there countless of times only to lose someone each and every time. She hoped this time no one would die. Why she didn't feel like this would turn out that well this time either.

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(||—||)

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"The hospital?" Madoka was running behind Homura as fast as she could. The hospital was a tall building with a lot of patients and employees. The witch could kill every single one of them at any instant. Most patients wouldn't even be able to run for their lives!

"It's on the second floor." Homura changed outfits and then jumped to an opened window on the stated floor. Madoka followed. As soon as they were in, the witch's barrier engulfed them. It was of a bright yellow, with some Irish figures in the background. Then, they looked around and saw beds. Empty hospital beds. Or not all empty, some of them still had the remains of human bodies full of holes, something akin to bees or flies flying above them. It was disgusting, and the shock stopped Madoka.

"Madoka-san! We need to deal with the witch as fast as we can and save the rest of them!" Madoka didn't budged, so Homura forcefully pulled her out of sight of the corpses' beds. Madoka was already trembling, and yet the fight hadn't even started.

They ran toward what seemed to be the center of the labyrinth. They saw other patients and nurses get attacked by carnivore beetles and insects, but they couldn't really help. Homura couldn't shoot such small targets and Madoka couldn't shoot enough of them, even though she tried. It was of no use to tell her to keep her magic for the witch; she wanted to save every last one of them even though it was impossible.

They then arrived in the main room, a big distorted bee hive with a giant cloud or bees or wasps flying above it. The redheaded girl was already there, fighting with a whip of flames the swarm. She was dominating it, summoning walls of fire here and there and killing the small fries as easily as she would have stepped on ants. She was going to annihilate the witch.

"Stop it!" Madoka cried. "You're killing her!"

"Why isn't that what you're supposed to do of a witch?" she replied. She did slow down her attacks though. She was confident that she could kill this one the eyes closed. Such was her advantage.

"We can bring her back like we did with you! So stop it!"

She stopped. "So what are you looking at? It's not like I'll give you a hand or anything." She sat on an empty bed, prepared to watch an interesting fight or so she supposed.

Madoka turned back to the witch. It was millions of tiny beings, but if she shot a beam large enough, maybe she could get them all in one blow. Homura ran into the fray, distracting the witch from Madoka, who posted herself at the rear. Homura couldn't do anything other than hide under her shield; a few bombs would be enough to kill the witch but that wasn't the goal here. The stings of the bees hurt like hell, as if being shot by a bullet.

Madoka took her aim, a circle of light forming around the tip of her arrow. The swarm was really big; will that shot really be enough?

She shot. As she feared, it wasn't. A large chunk of the swarm instantly vanished in the laser beam, followed by the sound of a falling object. An arm! The arm was still moving, albeit detached from any body. At the place of the elbow, there was a clean cut filled not with blood, but with moving figures and shadows, as if it was just another part of the barrier. The arm was twisting and crawling in pain. Madoka looked at it, horrified.

Somebody far behind her called her name, but she didn't hear it. The single severed arm was all she could think of.

"No, no, no." She took her aim again, this time putting as much magic as she could so she could take the whole swarm in that shot. But the swarm dodged, and only half of it got turned back. This time it was a torso with a head; and the head was dreadfully familiar.

Again, a voice called her by her name, but it was of no importance whatsoever now.

"Ma…Mami? MAMI-SEMPAI!" Madoka started to run toward the torso of her once dead friend.

"Madoka-san!" cried Homura, still under attack from the witch's frenzy. Mami's eyes were of the same unreal mix of colors as the edges of her severed body, and were twisting insanely.

But Madoka didn't hear a thing. There was only her and Mami that existed at this very moment. Something suddenly blocked her way, preventing her from reaching the half body on the ground. She tried to push it away but this obstacle was persistent and grabbed her.

"Let go of me! MAMI!"

"Madoka-chan, please! It's me, Akemi!"

"Akemi-chan! Look around its Mami-sempai! I need to go help her! Let me go!"

"I can't."

"WHY?"

"Because your soul gem can't take any more." Akemi was pointing at the stone around Madoka's neck. It was pitch dark, and it was already a miracle it didn't burst already.

"I don't care! I can save her! Please let me save her!" Madoka was desperately crying now. "Akemi… please?"

Akemi didn't answer, but she pulled her away from the broken body on the ground.

"no, please, let me. No. NO. NOOOOOOO!"

Redhead came toward the two to restrain a desperate little girl, and with her help Akemi was able to pull her friend away from this scene of gore.

"Homura-chan, please take care of the witch." Akemi said before taking Madoka outside the barrier.

The later nodded. She knew what she had to do.

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(||—||)

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A few minutes later and it was all over. Madoka was weeping in a corner, as far away from Akemi as she could, muttering to herself again and again 'I could have saved her, I could have saved her'.

Homura came out of the hospital and threw a grief seed in front of Madoka. She didn't take it. This grief seed was the last of Mami Tomoe.

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(||/|\||)

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	6. Chapter 6: Depression

Chapter 6: Depression

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"Take it."

"No!"

"You want to waste Mami Tomoe's live?"

"It's nothing like that! You killed her!"

"Between losing you, or Mami Tomoe, I made my choice. She wouldn't have wanted to sacrifice her life for nothing."

"Murderer!"

Homura tensed up at the accusation. "If you don't use her grief seed, then both of you will be lost. Think before you make that choice!"

Homura then turned around and left. She showed nothing of what she really felt at this event; inside she was as broken as Madoka. She didn't know how she was able to stand at all; her legs felt so weak and were trembling so hard that it was a wonder nobody noticed. She didn't know how she was able to walk strait without bowing down under the weight of this last scene of despair. She didn't know how she was able to leave Madoka behind in a state like this, but she did and she didn't look back.

"Oy!" Redhead called, as Homura walked pass her.

"What do you want, _no-name_?" She spoke harshly, spitting out every single words it took from her.

"Masami" she introduced, wary of Homura's aggressiveness. "Hotaru Masami." She paused, searching the right words for a situation like this. Finding none, she just walked away. "Nothing."

Homura tensed up even more. She wanted to rip that girl's face, rip _someone's_ face or _something_. She didn't like this girl at all; she never belonged to Madoka's group and never will. She couldn't understand. Madoka herself could not understand. Only she could bear the weight of those decisions, her and Akemi. She couldn't stand being around them any longer and she left; and as soon as she was out of sight she ran. Fast, as fast as she could as if to escape herself and her sins. She pushed herself to her limit and arrived at her home in only a few minutes.

She locked the door. No one should she her at this very vulnerable moment. She wanted to cry, to express everything she hid from the very beginning, not just the last event with Mami's witch, but everything, every sins she made since that very day she wished for returning in time to save Madoka.

She wasn't given that luxury.

"I have been watching the fight all along." Kyubey was behind the closed window, his voice piecing directly through Homura's mind.

"Go… away…" Her voice was broken, ready to cry, not talk.

"I noticed something strange when you fought Mami's witch." Behind the glass, Kyubey tilted his head, inquisitive. "Not once did you use any magic."

Homura flinched. _Oh shit! He noticed! _She tightened her arms around her legs, pulling them as close as she could to her body. She tried to make herself as small as possible behind her bed, hiding in vain from the presence out the window. She so badly needed to be alone right now, so badly needed to explode, but she couldn't. Not in front of anybody, and specially not in front of Kyubey. But was she really able to stay sane like this long enough for him to go away?

By the window, Kyubey continued to rub salt in the wound. "Before, you also showed a reticence to use your time magic, but I figured that you were trying to hide it from me at the time." He raised his paw and started to scratch the glass gently, trying to open the window from his side. The screeching noise was maddening. "This was proven right. When I discovered your power you made no effort whatsoever to hide it, and you then fought witches much more efficiently."

There was another slow, long scratch on the glass. _Did I lock the window? _Homura thought, panicked at the idea of Kyubey entering her house without her consent, entering her sole and only private place where she could cry out her pain in peace. But there was no peace that hold true with the Incubator.

Another screeching and he continued to talk. "You even showed an impossible display of strength against the Walpurgisnacht, but right after that you stopped."

_Go away! Go away!_ She was so tense that her hands started to hurt, her own fingers digging in her fists. Then there was the scariest sound she ever heard: another scratch, coming from the door this time. Kyubey's voice felt even closer than it was before, resounding many times in her head like echoes of guilt, preventing her from thinking of anything beside the words spoken.

"Why did you stopped? Was it to reduce the risks of becoming a witch? Or was it something else entirely?" He watched carefully should any display of emotion prove him right in his theory. "Was it because you couldn't use your powers?"

"SHUT YOUR TRAP!"

Homura rose to her feet, holding a gun pointed directly at the window. She looked scared, completely terrified by the idea that her weakness had been brought to light.

"What are you going to do? Shoot?" Surprisingly, the tone of his voice sounded amused, although this couldn't be since he didn't felt any emotions. Was Homura already losing her head? "Please do."

This took Homura aback. What was he saying? He wanted her to shoot? She pressed slightly more on the trigger, tightening her arms in anticipation of the recoil… but didn't shoot.

"You want me to give in and kill you so that I become a witch in doing so!"

"Indeed." The luxury of many bodies had its advantage.

She didn't move from her fighting stance, her strength split between the urge to get rid of the intruder, to give everything Kyubey took from her life back to him, to make him pay for every lie, every half truth, every misery he caused; and the desperate instinct of survival whose logic told her that shooting would be the end of everything, her life, Madoka's life and this whole planet heck even the whole world. Everything except the Incubator itself.

"As I expected, you hold your life and that of Madoka too dear to make this mistake. Speaking of which, did you tell anything to Madoka about this handicap of yours?"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" She made a single step toward the window, still holding the gun. But Kyubey knew it was just bluff and didn't even acknowledge the threat.

"You didn't." He blinked. "Why didn't you?"

Homura was trembling now. The small part of her head that was still thinking strait was screaming _Throw the gun away! Drop it, before you do a mistake! _But the gun was the only thing that prevented her from outright crumbling, keeping her in a dangerous balance on the edge of insanity. She was so confused about her own intentions that she even heard herself reply in a whisper to the Incubator. "Because they would worry uselessly, and would then fall into despair…"

"Oh? Really? I thought it was because you were afraid that Madoka would find you useless and that she would throw you away." His words pierced directly Homura's heart, reaching the most sensible part of her being: the part that she lied to herself all this time. She dropped the gun, unable to bear anything anymore, and dropped to her knee. He was right. She was afraid. She was afraid of losing Madoka. She was afraid of being rejected by her, of not being good enough for her. But worst of all, she was afraid of what she felt for her. All this time she fought against fate and tragedy without ever taking a look at her true motive. What did she want of all those years travelling timelines? What did she expected after she found her happy ending? What did she expect from Madoka?

What had Kyoko said again? '_There's an easier way to make a guy you fell in love with yours. Break his hands and legs so he'll never be able to use them again. Make him totally helpless without you. Then he'll be yours... body and soul._'

Was this what she felt from Madoka? Did she want Madoka all for herself? She wanted to protect her, to save her, to help her, but was this hiding the same need of possession? This had been the downfall of Sayaka, she knew that all too well. Unconfessed love, one where even oneself didn't know she was in love. Was what she was feeling… love?

It didn't matter what it was. Obsession, desire, need, friendship, love, whatever. All she knew for sure was that she would do anything to save Madoka from death and despair. Anything and everything. She wind up time countless of times, she witnessed the end of the world, she fought against fate, she even killed the one she wanted to protect at her demand; but most of all, she never gave up. Not to despair, nor fate or cruelty. And right now was not the time to give up either. For Madoka's sake, she needed to stay sane and human. She will not do the same mistake as Sayaka did. She will speak to her. Madoka knew already the story of her time travels, but none of her motives. Even Homura barely just realized those, and she still needed to put them in order before she could do anything about them. She needed time. But that's exactly what she lacked right now.

She laid there on the floor, not moving, for a few hours. It took her all of her energy to fight her demons and stabilize her mental state. She cried many times and blanked out the rest of it, but at the end she was still human, which was the essential. Completely exhausted, she fell asleep directly on the ground, felling that this lowest place of all fit her mood perfectly. She didn't hear the knocking on the door, nor the ringing of the bell of the other person living temporarily under this roof.

Kyubey left after a while, seeing that his attempt had failed. This was one very determined girl to withstand this much pain and sorrow.

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(||—||)

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"Meany-nee-chan won't open the door, desu!"

"I think she needs some time for herself." Akemi was still shocked from this agitated day, but she put those problems away to take care of Mitchiko. The seven years old was still fully capable of reading the mood around her and even without witnessing the tragedy, she shed tears for the others, specifically Madoka and Akemi.

Madoka didn't so much as look at Akemi. She simply went straight home, weeping every tears of her body. She did use the grief seed though, albeit very reluctantly. She treated it like it was Mami herself and when she left, she was still holding the seed against her heart. The seed was after that completely useless, as fully charged of negative emotions as it could take. That was one less thing to worry about and Akemi suspected Madoka of being able to forgive the two Homuras, but it might take a while and will be a delicate and hard subject to tackle.

And then there was Homura. She did kill Mami Tomoe. Akemi knew it was herself to blame; she took the decision, not Homura. But Homura was her future self, and if she had been in her position —killing a former ally that was suppose dead but that, just recently, could be brought back from corruption, and doing so in order to save her dearest friend that, meanwhile, tried everything she could to save the dead girl — she knew it would have been one of the biggest mental breakdown of her life. The only event she could compare it with was her last timeline where she killed Madoka, but that scene seemed terribly trivial compared to today's events and she gave in to despair in that timeline. She truly hoped that Homura would be okay, but in the off chance she did turn into a witch, she was prepared. Akemi still had a wish as an emergency exit.

"So, where do I sleep, desu-ka?" Mitchiko seemed fine now. It wasn't her sadness, it wasn't her fight.

"...I don't know. I don't have any place to sleep tonight either." As much as Homura, Madoka needed her solitude.

"So where are we going, desu-ka?"

"I don't know, Mitchiko-chan. I don't know."

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(||—||)

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Madoka came back walking to her house, alone. She had stopped crying only because there was nothing that came out when she tried, so she stopped tryin. But the tears that couldn't be shed continued to flow inside. It reopened the old wound of the time she saw Mami die at the hand of Charlotte. At that time, she was completely paralyzed in shock and incomprehension. It was then that she understood that Puella Magis were not immortal; in fact they were way more mortal than the humans they tried to protect. Now, it was a whole other story. Puella Magis could die _and _turn into witch. Weird how if she was able to save Mami she would be jumping of joy at this fact, but because she couldn't this just seemed like a morbid prank of fate.

When she opened the door, it was still early in the afternoon. She was sure her brother would still be at the kindergarten and her mother at work. But her dad was there, since he always worked at home; that should do it. She slammed the door shut and removed her shoes. This last part was difficult since it required an _effort_ from her, crunching down and extracting each foot one at a time with extreme fatigue. She heard the footsteps of her father come her way from his study.

"Madoka? Is school finished already?"

She didn't speak and went straight in his arms, seeking refuge and comfort. Her face still had the dried streaks of tears she shed earlier. Madoka's dad held her tight, clearly understanding that something was wrong.

Seeing that she wouldn't calm down with just that much, Tomohisa gently pulled Madoka in the living room and on the couch, before wrapping her in his arms again.

"Will you tell me what's going on?" She said no with her head. She wasn't crying, but might as well be.

"Do I need to find out with yes-no questions?" Nod. He sighed.

"Was it one of your friends?" Nod.

"Was it Hitomi?" Shake.

"Was it Akemi?" She didn't answer immediately, but then she nod.

"What did she do?"

"Yes, no."

Tomohisa sighed again, but did not complain and resumed with proper questions. "Was she mean to you?"

This time Madoka took some time to think. _Was she mean to me? No, not really, she just wanted to protect me._ "No."

_Oh, she spoke_. Her father, encouraged by this only word, continued his interrogation. Maybe with a few more questions she will be ready to answer with more than just a yes or a no. "Was she mean to somebody else?" Nod.

"Was she mean to Hitomi."

"No."

_So it's either a friend I don't know of, or somebody Madoka doesn't know at all._ Beside Hitomi and Akemi, Tomohisa wasn't aware of any other friends of hers. There had been Sayaka, but… "Was she doing this with bad intentions?"

"No, she wasn't."

_Oh three words!_ "So, from what I heard up to here," he summarized, "Akemi did something you didn't like to someone else, but she had good reasons to do so?"

"Probably." She wasn't sure anymore about Akemi and Homura's actions, if they were good or bad. They did kill Mami after all, was doing it in her interest cover any of that sin?

Her dad started to stoke her back gently. The phone rang, but he didn't make a move to get to it. Nothing was more urgent than soothing his daughter right now. He continued to talk, calm, reassuring. "I know some things about Akemi too you know. It's been over a weak since she came in. She's affectionate and caring. She would never do anything to harm you." He paused. "… unless it's cooking."

This brought a faint smile on Madoka's lips for a second. Yes, Akemi was one of the few persons she knew of that couldn't use an oven without burning the whole house down.

"I don't know what happened between you two, but whatever it was, she's still your friend. I'm sure right now she's worrying more about you than about herself. Times might be hard, but it's even harder if we're alone. So stay close to her."

After that, neither of them spoke much. An hour later, Madoka fell asleep in her father's arms. He took her to her room and tucked her in her bed. Then he went to check the phone call he missed; it was Madoka's school saying she skipped afternoon classes. He called back saying that she was sick and came home early, which was quite true in fact.

"Was she with Homura-san?" the secretary asked.

"Who's Homura?"

"Homura Akemi. She is a new transfer student here. She lives on her own and is always dead serious, reserved and has a distant look in her eyes. Does that ring any bells? She was last seen with Madoka-san and didn't come back to afternoon classes either."

"Does she have braids? And glasses?"

"What? No. Just plain, long black hair."

"I don't know about your Homura, sorry."

"Okay, then. Thank you for the call."

When Tomohisa put back the telephone, he wondered. _Is this Homura Akemi a relative of the Akemi we know? _There would be no answer this evening. And speaking of which, where is Akemi?

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(||—||)

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The next day, neither Madoka nor Homura showed up at school. Akemi appeared early in the morning with Mitchiko, reassuring Junko and Tomohisa about her safety.

"Where have you been?" asked Junko.

"I slept at a friend's house." When they got to the pet shop in the afternoon, they asked timidly for Emi's hospitality saying it would be 'only for a single night' and that she 'won't even notice we're there'. Emi had been more than willing to take the two girls for the night.

"You could've at least called."

"Sorry, I forgot," she said with some anguish, "and I was kind of afraid of disturbing Madoka. How is she?"

"In her bed. She won't be going to school today. Can you tell us what happened?"

"Not really…" Could she say anything about the past events? If she said anything, the two adults were sure to go talk to Madoka and ask some questions too, so lying would be a bad idea.

"Come on! It's been twice in less than a month!" Junko said in a strict voice. She was referring to Madoka's reaction to Sayaka's death. At that time, she had secluded herself in her room and stopped talking to her parents for a while.

"She witnessed someone she knew dying." _Was this too much to tell them?_

Junk and Tomohisa were both extremely shocked. "Oh my god! Is it …" Tomohisa didn't finish his sentence, but with the look in his eyes it was clear he was asking _Hitomi?_

"Not someone you know." replied Akemi

Madoka's parents were too shocked to ask for anything else. First Sayaka's disappearance, then a new friend's death! If only they knew… this was only a sliver of what their daughter had been through lately.

Akemi left with Mitchiko close behind. If she couldn't talk to Madoka just yet, she would try Homura. She needed to make sure that both of her friends were fine. Well, as fine as one could be in such a situation.

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(||/|\||)

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* * *

I was expecting this chapter to cover a bit more than it did, but I got caught in the sentimality and before I knew it I had reached my word count. So much for it, time to work on chapter 7.


	7. Chapter 7: Rise and Fall

Note: I got a certain review for chapter 5 saying that there already is a witch for Mami. Its name is Candeloro and it appears in the PSP game of Puella Magi Madoka Magica Portable. I was not aware of that and I'm sorry if it caused confusion for some, although I'm not sure if the information the PSP game provides can actually be called canon. I didn't know of the existence of the game until I received the review, and even now I still don't know much about it. This fiction is written with the anime's background and the manga Puella Magi Kazumi Magica in head. Any break from other sources, like Oriko's manga and anime, the PSP game or anything else I'm unaware of won't be changed even if you ask me to.

Thank you.

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Chapter 7: Rise and Fall

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Knock, knock. "Homura-chan, are you there?"

No answer.

"I still have a key to your apartment, so if you don't answer we will come in. Hello?"

From the depth of the apartment, a low broken voice made its way through the door to the two girls standing outside. "Go away."

"I will come in whatever you say, Homura-chan."

There was a pause, or maybe just the words were muffled through the many walls. Akemi and Mitchiko looked at each other, but neither of them had understood the last few words. "What did you say?" asked Akemi, clearly so to be heard from every part of the house.

"Mitchiko doesn't come here."

The little girl answered to the silent question of Akemi. "It's fine, desu! I can take care of myself for a short time."

"Okay, but don't talk at all to Kyubey if he happens to show himself."

"Sure nee-chan!"

Akemi turned the key in the door, leaving behind Mitchiko on the doorsteps to count flowers and cars. She hoped it wouldn't be too long; Kyubey had his eyes on the child for some reason.

She walked up the stairs and entered the single large room of digital walls. The walls did not display their usual array of witch pictures, graphs and information of all kind on a background of pure white; instead, they took the colors and form of wood planks, light coming dimly from some virtual candle on the walls. Homura was sitting on the ground, her back against one of the numerous half-circled couches. She had her usual stoic face.

"What do you want, Akemi-san?" she said in her cold harsh voice.

Akemi sat in front of her other self, in the same position as her as to show she also shared her pain and weakness. "I'm here to see how I'm doing."

"I'm not you."

"You were me, and I know how I would have reacted in the same situation."

"You didn't live through half as much as I did."

"Probably. I think I came back in time five or six times."

"You can still count yours huh?"

Akemi shifted her position a little. Sitting on the floor was not comfortable. The fact that Homura stayed like that for, what she guessed, a long time was proof that she didn't care about it at all. "Homura-chan, are you okay?"

"Yes, I am."

" 'Yes' was not a possible answer to this question."

Homura frowned before putting back her mask of motionless girl. "Is 'no' an acceptable answer then?"

"Only if you make the effort to talk about it."

"Okay, I'll talk about it." She paused, looking in emptiness for some time, maybe collecting her thoughts or just not thinking at all about what she was going to say. "I'm out of this."

Akemi didn't understand what she was talking about at first. "What?"

Homura, for only explanation, transformed into her magical girl suit and showed Akemi her weapon.

She understood then. "Oh, the shield..."

"Yeah, the shield. I'm out."

They stopped talking for a few moments, Akemi figuring more and more the issue at sake. "It never crossed my mind at all since I'm here."

"It didn't crossed mine either until I tried." She transformed back to her normal clothes. After that there was a sudden change in her facial expression. Her eyes widen, looking, piercing directly at Akemi in a very intimidating way. "That's why I ask you to take my place." The way she said it, it was more an order than a request. "Take my role, and protect Madoka. Do it for me."

"You... want me to contract? Like, right now?" She wasn't so sure about this. Up until now, she had kept her wish safely as an emergency option. Now, Homura was asking her to throw it away. "But what will I wish for?"

"I'm sure you're able to think of something on your own, Akemi-san." Her scary look disappeared, as if she was exhausted of holding such a face. "I'm not asking you to do it right now, but soon." She stared at the walls, hypnotised by the fake shadows the candles displayed. "Tomorrow,... or today if I'm feeling strong enough, I'm going to tell everything I can to Madoka."

"About the shield?"

"Yes, but maybe more. I don't know as of yet exactly what I will say; this is the first time I'm forced to give up on her, but I will try to tell her why all this happened in the first place." She was trying to talk in a cryptic way, but it didn't fool Akemi.

"You feel something for her, don't you?" Homura did not answer to that. Akemi stood up and came on the same side of Homura before sitting next to her. "I think I understand how you feel, although I don't feel the same."

"You don't?"

"Well, I do like Madoka, as a friend and all. But it isn't me who came back thousands of times just to save her. I gave in, you did not. You are different, and time made you different. I'm just glad she alive, even though I will try and help my friends as much as I can." She came closer to Homura, trying to break her shell, to show her that she could rely on her as much as on herself. "If you love her, just tell her."

"But what if she rejects me?" Although she cried a lot in the night, her eyes became wet again. The tears just came, one at a time. It wasn't much, and she still kept her cold face, but a few silent tears simply flowed down on the same path so many others did earlier.

"Then she will do so as gently as she can. It's Madoka we are talking about. She'll still be your friend."

Akemi hugged her like a mother would do to her crying child, and Homura did not push her away.

They talked some more after that, each word giving a little bit of life to Homura.

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(||—||)

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Jyubey was looking at the town from one of the highest skyscraper, all of glass and twisting in a way that could only be described as unreal. Architecture these days...

From his high point of view, he could observe Mitakihara in its entirety. There were all those magnificent bodies of glass and steel, reaching for the stars from their static stature. It was an exploit, a piece of art and proof of the know-how of humans. He was looking at all that, and at the same time wasn't looking at anything. He was scheming. Against Kyubey.

He had some more bodies on the ground, wandering through every alley. Jyubey's eyes gradually coved more and more streets, his stare creeping and stretching with every step of his agents. Blank spots disappeared one after the other. Soon, he would be settled as one gigantic eye looking at every single events of this town from every possible angle.

And he was searching for something. Not Kyubey; that guy made no effort to hide his presence. Their encounter was brief, clear, and without harm. Why bother? Trying to eradicate one or the other was as futile as trying to purge Earth from humans by attacking solely a single city. They both acknowledged each other's existence, and then parted their ways. Kyubey was not his immediate target; his tools were.

That was what he was searching for: Puella Magis that belonged to Kyubey. The presence over the city gave out their number: three. Three distinct auras of grief, sadness and pain; two much stronger than the average for a magical girl, the other one... wild would be an appropriate term. But their locations still remained unknown, up until he caught a glimpse of magic. One of them had just transformed, letting go without noticing it a small puff of energy that any Incubators could easily locate the origin within miles. Then, right after, it was gone. But the location had been given away.

Jyubey immediately sent an agent to the domicile in question. He had a plan. The Pleiades were helping him reluctantly. Any diplomacy with other Puella Magis was sure to take them away from him, and they were his most reliable tool for now. He needed to avoid diplomacy. He needed aggressively, on both sides. If the girls in this town were aggressive to strangers, then the Pleiades will return the aggressiveness, and hate will emerge, fuelling hate. Before he could ask them to kill an enemy Puella Magi, they would need to hate their enemy.

He had a plan just for that.

At the magical girl's house, a young one was waiting on the porch. She looked pretty bored. _Time to get hated._

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(||—||)

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Mitchiko had soon been bored of counting cars, and flowers, and passerby, but she didn't want to barge in the house until Akemi told her it was okay. To kill time she started to test her pronunciation with tongue-twisters, an exercise she quite enjoyed in her past life. Before the event with her parents, she had a hobby of collecting strange words and sentences, which her wish simply reinforced thereafter. _Let's see..._

"Moralité, Maure Ali, t'es mort alité." _French, easy._ _Let's try something harder_. "The seething sea ceaseth, and thus the ceessing thea ssssusciffeth uff.." _Arg! Almost!_ She repeated it a few times, carefully rolling the 's' and 'th' and 'f' with her tongue before giving it another try. "The seething sea ceaseth, and thus the seething sea sufficeth us." _On to an even harder! German!_ "Fischers Fritz fichstchzztzsche Ffshctshssizshzte." She gave up on that last one after no less than twenty tries. She then noticed an incoming small white animal.

"Kyubey?" Mitchiko reminded herself of Akemi's warning and shut up, deciding that she didn't need to talk to him at all, thus preventing her from making any unwanted wish. But she just did tongue twisters to warm up and now her tongue was itching to talk.

"No, I'm not Kyubey. I'm Jyubey."

Mitchiko looked at the ring of fur and at the circle on his head. He did look a bit different; could she talk to him then?

Jyubey was operating meticulously. First, he needed to know what Kyubey's relationship with his magical girls was. "Are you a Puella Magi?" he asked innocently.

Mitchiko didn't dare to answer with her voice and shook her head instead. She still wondered if she should call Akemi or Homura to deal with this.

"Oh, so you know what I'm talking about. Good. So you know Kyubey?"

"Yes I know him." She hurried to place her hands on her mouth to prevent herself from talking any more.

"Is he mean to you? Or people you know?"

"Well, He made Madoka cry and..." She stopped abruptly and walked in a kind of hurry to the door. She rang and knocked. "Akemi-nee-san! Please come here, desu." She was kind of panicked, not so much by Jyubey than by her own disobedience to Akemi's words.

In her panic, she caught the attention of some people walking by the streets. She didn't noticed and Jyubey couldn't care less.

_Knowledge up to now: That girl is normal; she's panicked by Kyubey and that guy doesn't go easy on them Puella Magis. Current magical girls are Madoka and Akemi out of the three. That was a good start!_ Jyubey though. If they were attached to Kyubey, he would have taken his time to demolish their pretty beautiful world full of lies. But as thing were, it saved him some work and time. _Now on to the next part._ "If he is, then you can come with me. You know about this world. I'm sure he won't let you be and will try by any mean to turn you into another Puella Magi. If you come with me I can guarantee that you will never need grief seeds ever again."

"Really, desu-ka? How?"

"I can absorb grief directly into my fur, with the same effect as a grief seed. All you need to do is a contract with me, and then you will be safe from Kyubey."

The door then opened on a girl with two large purple braids and glasses. Another girl, fairly similar, stood in the stairway. As soon as she saw Jyubey, that last one clenched her teeth. "Kyubey!"

"Good grief, how many times will I have to explain..." He did not finish his sentence that already Homura was on him. Her grip was firm and violent. She held him against the wall, already planning on how to beat this little being to a pulp. On the other side of the street, a few persons stopped to watch the strange display in the middle of the two connecting streets. From their point of view, Homura was aggressive against a _wall_; it was odd, but not enough that they would remember the event until the night.

"Now, I'm sane enough to kill you properly." The threat was much scarier with her flat tone, as if killing him was no more important than killing of a fly.

"I'm not Kyubey."

"So then who are you?"

"I'm Jyubey. And you are Akemi I suppose?"

"You don't have to know anything about me. If you're not Kyubey, what are you doing here?"

Time for the third part of the plan. _Hate me all you want. _"I'm here to kill his Puella Magis."

Homura, holding him by the neck, wacked his head against the concrete of the wall, managing her strength to not kill him right here and there. "What did you say? I think I misheard."

Blood flowed from Jyubey's wound, but he wasn't hampered at all in his speech. "I said I'm here to kill you, Akemi."

This time Homura squeezed his neck slowly. There was a cracking noise; she didn't feel like restraining herself on this one.

"You think that killing me will save you?" Another Jyubey appeared on the other side of the Y shape road. "Your fate has already been decided. In a few days, three executioners will come for your head and those of the other Puella Magis in this town."

The girl with glasses spoke to Jyubey. "So why do you tell us this? Wouldn't it be easier to just kill us without warning?"

"Becoming witches is also an option. That's why I came. And I also want to recruit those that were still human in your group."

This one received a shot of Beretta 92 right in between his two eyes. Homura acted like she was purging this area of all evil. The crowd that had been forming almost instantly vanish, screaming in fear at the sight of a girl so young holding a gun. At least now the street was empty, and she will have all her leeway to target this bastard without anyone interfering. The police would be a problem latter though... but now that abomination was all that mattered.

"But since I'm not welcome, I'll leave you at the hand of sick Kyubey." Homura turned to the roof, looking where the voice came from. She saw a faint shadow, blurred by the bright sun, and shot half of the magazines blindly. "We will see each other soon."

Then he was gone.

"Executioners..." The sound of it didn't pleased Akemi at all. "This means that Madoka and you are targeted. But you're..."

"Not here!" cut Homura, not wanting her weakness to be given out this early. She wasn't reassured either. If it was three on one, she wouldn't —couldn't— even put much of a fight. And Madoka was Madoka; she couldn't kill anymore, be it Puella Magis or witches. Masami was not a reliable ally either.

"Akemi-san, I guess your time to find a good wish was cut down." She looked at the glass wearing girl, dead serious. "You will need to protect Madoka of, probably, other Puella Magis. Can you do it?"

The look on Homura's face was frightening. When it came to Madoka-san's safety, every other thing in the world lost importance to her. Akemi twitched, but found her own resolve and said, determined: "I can do it!"

"You will kill those girls if they become life threatening? And you will be able to do so against Madoka-san's screams and will? Will you be able to protect her from her own foolhardiness?" While saying this Homura came closer to Akemi until she stood right in front of her, as threatening as she could be; exactly as if she was testing Akemi's resolve and strength. It felt kind of ceremonial in fact.

At those last lines Akemi hesitated, but it didn't last long. "I will! I asked you to do so during Mami's fight; now you are asking me the same thing, so I won't fail no matter what!"

At this, Homura relaxed a bit. "I have faith in you. Be proud; it's the first time I have to depend on someone other than me since... a long time."

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(||—||)

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"I see you came messing with the girls." Kyubey was looking at the trio down there: Homura entering in her house again and Akemi and Mitchiko leaving for some other place. The sun was high; Kyubey's white form was lightly reflecting the light of the sun from his high vantage point.

Jyubey was a few feet away, looking at the exact same thing. This one had more black fur than the usual. "Will you not try to prevent me at all?"

"No, that would be meaningless. None of them listen to me anymore, and I don't believe you can actually kill them."

"Don't underestimate my Puella Magis."

"I'm not underestimating yours, I'm underestimating mines. Constantly."

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When Akemi left Homura's residence, with Mitchiko walking in her shadow, she was thinking about possible wishes to make. It was urgent that she found one so she could benefit of some training before the fateful encounter. Madoka was at stakes here, so no messing around!

_But which wish to make? _Before she left, Homura asked her an oblivious question: "_You do know about the rule of equivalent exchange, do you?_" Of course she knew! If you wish for happiness, the same amount of grief will be created, and you will suffer such grief instead of the happiness you wished for. That was why Sayaka turned into a witch in each and every timeline she contracts; she wished for Kyousuke's happiness, and she suffered that much sadness as an exchange. That meant that Akemi shouldn't wish for happiness directly. She should focus on the means of achieving such happiness on her own instead. But what did she really want?

She wanted Madoka to be safe, and Homura and Mitchiko and herself and everyone she cared or would care about. She wanted to be useful and to be able to protect Madoka and every other she just mentioned, but such a wish would immediately doom her to despair. Madoka wished to give hope and a second chance to corrupted Puella Magis, and she suffered the drawback.

"Where are we going, desu-ka?"

"I don't know." She just left Homura's residence; there was only Tomohisa at Madoka's house, and the pet shop was quite far away. Where did they belonged, both of them? They were just a burden on others, requiring hospitality from Homura, Junko and Emi because they had no home to speak of. It was then that it hit her.

She was at the bus station, maybe unconsciously going to see Emi-sempai. There weren't much people at this hour. "Kyubey!" she called. "Show yourself!"

A few seconds later the little alien appeared, walking the same path they took to get here. He had been following them around, and Akemi knew that there was no helping it. But thanks to that, she did not need to go look for him through the city.

"You need me?"

"Strangely, yes. I want to contract."

"What is your wish?"

"I want a place that can offer shelter and safety to me and any others I care about!"

"Come here; let's not alarm every human in the area with the process of the transformation."

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	8. Chapter 8: Eden, the Lost Paradise

Chapter 8: Eden, the Lost Paradise

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Another Jyubey was sleeping comfortably at Kazumi's residence. Well, his body was sleeping actually; his mind was not. Having witnessed the encounter with the Puella magi 'Akemi' like every other body of his, Jyubey decided it was the time to start moving. He woke up and stretched slowly in a cat-like manner before walking through the huge house to look for Kazumi or Umika. Kazumi was the one that most welcomed his presence here, but if he tried to talk to her, Umika would deduce immediately that he was trying to manipulate her. Instead, he looked out specifically for the best-seller writer. As he expected, he found her in the study, in front of her computer.

He jumped on the other side of the desk and laid down on his paws, waiting for the good moment to talk to her. She continued writing for a few lines, and only then did she acknowledge his existence.

"Jyubey. What do you want? I'm writing."

"I noticed and I didn't want to disturb, but I went to check Mitakihara with some other agents and I thought that you would like to hear the report."

"Go ahead." She resumed writing, half listening to what he had to say.

"There are three Puella magi there." he started. "I encountered one of them that seemed to have two human friends with her, both knowing. The one I encountered was quite aggressive. She killed me twice. I have matter to believe that this particular Puella magi, and the others probably, don't maintain a good relationship with their Incubator."

"Did you notice what kind of magic she used?"

"No. I only noticed her transformation and the materialization of her weapon."

"Which is?"

"An army handgun. She was quite accurate with it; I received a bullet between my eyes at some distance from her."

Umika was thinking. _A gun? Weird_. "And how did you die the other time?"

"She broke my neck."

_Brutal. I believe she is aggressive after all_. "Anything about Kyubey and his 'bad work'?"

"Not yet. I will continue to look for that, although in my opinion it would be best to get going as soon as possible. I don't really want to get that abominable feeling again."

"What feeling?" Her typing slowed a bit due to multitasking on two very different subjects.

"The feeling I got a few times now when the energy flow was reverse. This is what got me concerned in the first place."

"Fine, we'll do as you say. When should we get going?"

"As soon as possible. Tomorrow morning if you girls don't see any inconveniences."

Umika then dismissed him with a movement of the hand. She had stopped writing. Completely. There were other things to focus on right now, other priorities. She needed to be ready in the event that they had to fight against those three magical girls. So she closed her computer and materialized her magical book. And she began to reread every entries she had stolen thanks to Ex-file. Names, history, powers, foreign magic, tactics. She needed every technique she could get, every magic she could master. She already learned Rosa Fantasma and some other techniques, but she felt like it wouldn't be enough.

You could never be over-prepared for a fight against an unknown opponent. Never.

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(||—||)

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Akemi felt her body. Not that she did not felt it before, but now it was particularly present, as if her own body was that of a stranger. She felt cold, ripped, hard... and strong. She could feel her heart, racing a moment earlier, calm down to a rhythm she couldn't have guessed possible. It was her second time forming a contract, but the sensations were as new as the first time, even more alien now that she knew this was an empty shell she occupied. Her movements and muscles respond to thought alone. No need to apply pressure to move fingers, no need for strength to lift an arm, no need for endurance to run, no need for a body to live. She could feel every heartbeat feed every part of her body with magic, with her own soul.

Then she opened her eyes and the sensations of her own body disappeared under the new visual information.

"What the..." She was floating in the middle of a nebula of colors. There were no up, no down, no right or left. There were no frontiers, no obstacles, and no creatures as far as she could see. There were only colors, shifting ever so slightly in the vastness of this space.

"A witch barrier?"

"Not quite. This is your own barrier." Kyubey was floating alongside Akemi. He was moving around her with grace and dexterity; seems like he already got a hold of the physics of this place. She could also see Mitchiko a few meters under her back.

"Mitchiko-chan! Are you okay?" Her voice seemed amplified by this distorted place even though normal logic would have it spread out to infinity and get lost along the way.

"Yes nee-san!"

"I suggest you put us on the floor first. Both of you would be more comfortable."

"What?" As soon as Kyubey said the word 'floor' Akemi and Mitchiko fell on a plane landscape that wasn't there the instant before. This land was totally flat and hard, like some kind of metal or something like it. The drop was strangely painless, even though from her height, Akemi should have felt it through every bones of her new body. Mitchiko didn't fell more than a few centimeters, the floor appearing right under her.

"That's better, and you even though of gravity."

"What is this all about Kyubey?" She sounded confused. The disturbing feather-fall didn't help.

"What, this is the place you wished for. It can cover any need you or your friends happen to have. You can model it to your liking and food here is edible. The principal restriction though is that anything created here can't get carried out to the outside world."

"I make the rules? So if I think about a house,..." Just then a house appeared, a perfect replica of Homura's apartment. "Okay, this is creepy... but cool!" She was greatly amazed by her display of godlike power. Her eyes were wide open and she was running all around the house like a little kid happy to play with his new toy. "Just like a witch. So creepy... but so cool! But mostly creepy, and way too easy. It should require at least a little bit of concentration or else I could end up destroying everything by just thinking about it."

"And that shall be. This is the first rule you issued. Congratulation. Now try summoning a piano, just to see." This time nothing happened at the mention of 'piano'. Akemi needed to clearly focus on the shape of the piano and her desire for it to appear, and just then the piano was created.

Akemi was amazed. "Wait, but isn't it too much? I can do anything in here. I'm the God of this place! Wouldn't it be like cheating to just bring something here, like a witch, and kill her with anything I happen to think of?" She was so excited that she was already thinking of every possible utility of this... world.

"You will learn the limits of this place eventually." said Kyubey, jumping on the piano's bench and putting a paw on the keys to test the sound. A pure, perfect note came out from the beautiful black grand piano. "Yes, this is the same as a witch's labyrinth, but you should know that such a barrier reflects its creator's mindset. Your wish was for protection, I doubt you could so much as scratch yourself or anyone else inside. And it also requires magic to create and sustain objects here."

Mitchiko came running into Akemi's arms. "If nee-san can do anything she wants, then I want CAKE, desu!"

"Can I allow her to create things to?"

"Another limitation I think."

"Well, anyway this is just perfect." She was very glad of her wish and couldn't imagine how she could ever regret the creation of this place. "What kind of cake do you want Mitchiko-chan?"

"A biiiiiigggg chocolate mousse!"

"He he. Let's celebrate this then."

During the next half of the day, Akemi modeled her own perfect house with Mitchiko's creativity and her help for the design. She learned to link her barrier to the real world in many different places, like Homura's home, Madoka's, the school and the pet shop. After she did that last one, Akemi couldn't resist the urge to create a little perfect and cute puppy like the one she once saw in the display. It was a great success, and soon the labyrinth was filled with many animals she learned to care and to love thanks to Emi-sempai. She also created flowers for the butterflies. She loved butterflies.

They called the place Eden.

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(||—||)

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Madoka's day passed slowly. She didn't want to do anything, so she did nothing instead. She stayed in pyjamas all day, rising from the bed or the couch every once in a while to eat something or to go to the bathroom before laying down again. The TV had nothing good; of course since it was school day and the TV station supposed you'd be at your desk, listening to the teacher. So she did nothing.

She didn't want to think either. She had already done much of it the previous night, and thinking about Mami any more would just be painful. She dozed off a few times, her dreams resembling a lot the inside of witches' barriers; confused and without any logic.

It did help though. This full day, doing nothing, thinking about nothing, sleeping and not stressing out; yes it did help. Her thoughts were clearers and her body felt more relaxed. Although she still felt like her heart was emptied of all substance, like it was missing a big chunk of life. She knew she would have to bear with it and that it may never heal. She really hope it did.

It was late in the afternoon when she was well enough to start thinking again, rebooting the whole machine. Was Akemi okay? And Homura? She had been selfish of treating her like a murderer; Homura too must have suffered through it! "I'm so worthless. She does so much for me; they both do so much for me, and yet I'm here, lamenting myself."

She looked through the window and noticed that the sun was going down. Akemi wasn't home yet, and she didn't know if she should go hunt witches with Homura again today. Puella magi don't get to rest. One thing was sure: she couldn't stay in the house any longer. She couldn't escape forever from Homura and Akemi. So she got dressed, transformed her soul gem into a ring and walk down the stairs. Her dad was in the kitchen, preparing the super.

" 'You going better dear?" he asked, hearing her footsteps coming closer to him.

"I think I'm fine, but I need to make sure Akemi is too."

"She came this morning. She asked us how you were doing. She seemed pretty worried."

Madoka was surprised. "She came? Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because your mother and I didn't think you were in any mood to see her, and Akemi agreed. She also told us what happened."

This was a shock. "What? What did she tell you?"

"That you saw someone dying."

_Pfew! Just that much_. "Ye...yeah."

Her dad turned around and lowered himself to her height. "You know you can talk to us about anything. If you can't bear it anymore, your mother and I will always be there for you. Don't forget this."

"Thanks dad." She hugged him. "I'll be going now."

"You don't want to eat super first?"

"Sorry. Keep me a plate please." And she got going.

She opened the door exactly at the same time Akemi was going to knock on it from the other side. They exclaimed both at the same time:

"Madoka-chan!"

"Akemi-can!"

Akemi started laughing softly and Madoka smiled. "So you recovered a bit?" Akemi asked.

Madoka closed the door behind her. "Yeah, I guess I did. Sorry Akemi-chan."

"You don't have to apologise to me. I'm to blame for it; I took the decision. I apologise, although I don't regret making that decision." They walked down the stairs, the sun still slightly above the horizon. "I'm glad you better. I was worried you wouldn't want to talk to us for days."

"My dad was there for me." They were walking toward the park, the place they had settled as the gathering point. It was still early; Madoka was wondering if Homura was already there. "Isn't Mitchiko-chan with you Akemi-chan?"

She smiled. "Don't worry. I left her in a safe place." The only thing that could happen to Mitchiko right now was an overdose of sugar. She had nothing to worry about.

When the park came into view, they saw Homura waiting there like usual. She was holding her soul gem in her open palm. It shed some very dim purple light, a sign of depravation. "You are here early today." She said, hiding the gem in her pocket.

Before saying anything else, Madoka bowed down in front of Homura and said, in a timid voice: "I'm sorry Homura-chan for calling you a murderer! It was rude, and I didn't understand you were doing this for me and..."

"Apologies accepted." She had that low flat tone her hers. "Now stand up. We have some matter to discuss. A few things happened today."

"What?"

Akemi made a few steps forwards, a huge smile on her face. "First of all, I made a contract! I'm a Puella magi now too!"

"Akemi-san, please refrain from saying anything. I would like to cover everything in order."

"You're a Puella magi? But why now? Why did you contract?"

"Because I can't fight anymore." Homura said.

Madoka Looked back at her, not wanting to understand those words. "Of course you can fight! You're the strongest girl I ever saw. How come you can't?"

Homura sighted and explqined. "The source of my power was my shield. It acted like an hourglass. The sand was flowing from one compartment to the other and when I cut the flow, time stopped." She transformed to show her shield to Madoka. The circled piece of steel had two distinct sphere compartment linked together with a tiny glass string where the sand was supposed to go through. "I had a month worth of sand, and the month expired on the day of the Walpurgis night. Since then, I have no magic except my dimensional pocket, and my stock of weapon is dangerously low."

"Can't you just get some more?" Madoka was quite worried of the implications of it.

"Without time-stop, I can't go steal anything from the army like I used to. For now, all I have is a few guns and one or two rocket launchers. It's enough to kill a witch, maybe two if I don't miss with any rocket launcher, but after that, that's it. I will try to keep what I have now for self defence or in case of emergency. That's why I asked Akemi-san to contract."

"But you don't have to worry Madoka-chan!" She was a bit too enthusiastic for the bad news that Homura just delivered. "I will protect you as well as I can!"

"Err...Thanks. But why do I need protection? I can take witches on my own..." She herself didn't sound really convinced of those words.

Akemi put both her hands on her hips, trying to look severe, although it failed because of her enthusiasm. "Face it Madoka. If you were left alone, you would go around transforming every witch you see into girls and you would never, ever think about yourself and would never harvest any grief seeds."

Madoka shrugged and looked to the ground. "So I really need to kill girls do I?"

"Stop thinking about it like that, Madoka-san." Homura was looking at her way more strictly than Akemi, many years of profession behind this glare. "You don't kill girls, you kill witches, like every Puella magi did before you and like a lot more will do after you." She softened her tone a little. She didn't want to outright scare her. "Every one you will save will already be a miracle, but you can't save them all. And consider that if you let yourself get tuned into a witch, then not only will you be unable to save anyone anymore, but you will also cause the destruction of this whole planet. So please, Madoka-san, do use grief seeds." That last bit was spoken in a whisper, just like a plea.

"I... I will try."

"Good." Continued Homura. "Now, on with some more bad news." She then spoke about her encounter with Jyubey and the threat of the 'executioners'. "This is the second reason Akemi contracted so soon; so she could have some training before then."

Akemi, not standing in place anymore, said: "Can we get going now? I really want to try my new powers on a witch or two!"

"You're way too happy at this." Madoka noticed.

Her smile just got even larger.

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(||—||)

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* * *

Have no fear. THERE WILL BE ACTION IN THE NEXT CHAPTER!

You will also get to see Akemi's new weapon and magic. Obviously, she won't be able to do time stop and time looping anymore, but it will have to do with her wish and her Eden.

You might complain that Akemi having a whole dimension to herself is a bit excessive, but I reasure you. It isn't. It's just perfect. It's quite flashy, but hardly abusive with the restrictions I posed.

Stay tuned for the next chapter!


	9. Chapter 9: A Seed of Hate

Chapter 9: A Seed of Hate

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On top of the highest building of the industrial ward, there stood a silhouette; red hair turning fiery gold in the evening's setting sun. She stood on the antenna with perfect balance, her soul gem held before her. This was her hunt, this was her city; and this city was rich in witches and grief seeds.

She was trying to sense the presence of any abomination in this part of the city. She stood there, unmoving for some time. No results, oh well. She then moved to another ward and repeated the process. There! A witch, a prey. She could have some fun tonight; something better than tearing the limbs of every Kyubeys she happened to call to her. This guy was no fun; he didn't screamed or anything when she tortured him. It was useless. Witches screamed. It was much better like this!

She jumped from her skyscraper, sliding on its walls of glass like surfing on a wave. An extreme, abrupt wave. This was so much fun! This was when she really felt living; at this very moment where her life could end on a single mistake on her part.

As soon as she touched the ground she flew like a bullet toward her target. It was easy, so easy. She tore the frontier of the monster's barrier and allowed herself in its lair. Weak; this one was weak. There were just a few minions that roamed around, not enough to be a threat. She killed them with impatience. They were only a nuisance, slowing her on her way toward the witch. Blasted, burned, toasted, fried, cooked, melted; none were left but the jewel: the witch.

She walked straight to it and, she swears, she could see it back in fear. "Please, let me enjoy this to the fullest. Stay alive,... if you can." She grinned, sarcastically, sadistically, madly. A long whip of flames slowly formed in her open hand. Taking pleasure in the suffering of others; that's the only way life should be.

The witch was dead right when she started to warm up. She needed another one. She needed to keep going. So she resumed the hunt, looking in the central ward this time. It was her lucky day; she smelled another prey not that far away. With her scary grin, she made a mental note to make this one last. If she could.

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(||—||)

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Madoka, Homura and Akemi were chasing the witch around. It was blinking in and out of its barrier, moving around the area a lot, which made its capture quite difficult. The three magical girls were trying to follow its displacements by jumping from roof to roof, but the sudden changes between the interior and exterior of the barrier were quite confusing.

"Akemi-chan. Can you keep it from running around?"

"For that I would need to get close to it first, Madoka-chan." Akemi, even with her new reinforced body, had a hard time keeping up with Madoka and the witch. She had never been quite good at sports for as long as she could remember. Quickly fatigued, she got an idea and made a sphere appear in her hand and stretched it in a wide floating disk on which she jumped on. Now, this was way better. She manoeuvred the disk around, floating a few feet above the roofs. It was faster than running and with this she finally could chase the ball of mouths effectively, leaving behind the pink girl for ranged attacks.

The witch tried to slash at the incoming Puella magi with its tentacles, but Akemi protected herself under another rock solid glass disk before projecting it at high speed on the tentacles. It cut two out of the six, and then the witch blinked again.

"Damn! What an annoying one!"

Homura was close to the battle scene, but didn't take part in the witch hunting. She was there as an emergency option and was prepared to take out a rocket launcher at any time if the two newbie proved unsuccessful, although she would really prefer not to have to.

Akemi materialised many orbs of glass and changed their form to piercing needles before magically throwing them at the moving target. Some of the needle succeeded at pinning the witch to the ground. She immediately continued her attack by crashing multiple orbs on it, not leaving any time for it to escape.

Madoka readied her bow. "Akemi-chan, it's cute that your weapons are bubbles!" She teased her friend while taking her aim. Several circles of runes floated in the air toward the point of the light arrow.

A smile appeared on her face. "They're not bubbles! They're orbs! Orbs!" She sidestepped to give a clear line of sight for Madoka to shoot and continued to attack the witch by throwing orbs and needles at it.

The two girls were doing great, Honura though. At this pace, the witch would return to her human self any time now. At this moment, she looked away and noticed someone running in their direction. _The older girl! What is she doing here? Was she attracted by the fight? Not your luck; this witch is ours_. The teenager —Hotaru Masami was it?— looked back and they stared at each other for some time. When Homura broke the eye contact and turned around to watch the fight again, something had gone wrong. Terribly wrong. "SHIT!" she screamed while reaching for her pocket dimension in her shield.

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(||—||)

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Madoka shot. She had a clear line of sight to her target. Her arrow of light spread out as soon as she fired into a nice big cone of pink energy, completely engulfing the witch. It was a perfect shot. She couldn't have guessed what was to come.

"Nice one Madoka!" Akemi shout, landing on a roof of an upside-down doll house, thinking the fight was over.

But it wasn't. When the ray dissipated, the witch was still there in all its round ugliness: a big ball of moving mouth that merged and split in impossible ways, drool oozing out from the hideous orifices and some tentacles under the mass of it all. Since it wasn't under attack anymore, it broke the few needles that were holding him and smashed a really confused Akemi into the toy house. The roof — or the basement depending how you looked at it— explodes under the shock, throwing debris everywhere. Akemi was under them.

"Why?...Why didn't it worked?"

The witch was coming her way now. Fast. In a blink of an eye the labyrinth disappeared, replaced by the mundane skyscrapers all around them; and in another it reappeared, the tall glass sculpture transformed into a mess of child toys, the witch three hundred meters closer to Madoka. She hastily took her bow and shot in fear a huge blast at point-blank range. It didn't even slow it down. _Why? Why? WHY?_ All of the thousands of mouths all around the witch's round form moved toward the front, merging into a single humongous hole filled with uncountable teeth and tongues. It was now so close she could smell the putrid smell of its breath.

Madoka froze, dread claiming a hold on her body. This was how Mami got killed. She got behead and eaten by Charlotte. Madoka remembered it all in too much detail. The perfect smile of Mami replaced in an instant with absolute terror and incomprehension, the blood that dropped from her severed body when death took her, the awful crunching noise that that caterpillar monster did when it feasted on her remains. And now it was her turn. She was going to get killed. She was going to get eaten alive. She was in that razor sharp hole, doomed to death. Was this what Mami felt at that time? Terror? Incomprehension? Fatality?

The witch was all around Madoka now, casting her humongous shadow on a fear-stricken girl, its mouth wrapping around the pink girl like around a delicious candy. But the witch did not have the time to close her mouth. She received a RPG-7 missile on the side and got pushed back thanks to the explosion.

"MADOKA!" Homura screamed from the edge of the barrier.

But the witch wasn't dead yet. It was badly injured, Homura having missed the vital point in fear of harming her friend.

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(||—||)

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Masami got closer to the fight, following the teleportations of the witch around until it stopped and the fight really started. She saw the three girls fighting. Oh that one (Akemi) was also a Puella magi? And this girl (Homura) was not fighting? Did they take turns or anything? The fight was going well in the magical girls favor. Sure they could do better; using a single girl to pin the witch and another to land the finishing blow wasn't as effective as restraining its movement with coordinated attacks. But why did this one not fight?

Homura looked in Masami's direction, and for a second each of them was trying to make sense of the other's motive.

_Bah... This one is taken. I should go look elsewhere..._

Just when she was about to leave she heard someone shout 'shit' and a large explosion just after that. Surprised and curious, she looked around to see an interesting twist of fate. _Well, well, well. Maybe I'll get my turn after all._

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(||—||)

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Madoka came to and realized she was in a translucent bubble. The flames of the explosion reached the edge of the bubble, but they just slid along it without breaking the sphere. Everywhere she looked was a mix of red, yellow and orange, the colors of flames. She didn't felt any change in temperature or any shock at all. The flames vanished, and a few seconds later the bubble disappeared too. She saw Akemi, laying on the ground under the wrecked doll house, drop her arm in exhaustion, relieved.

"Madoka! Are you alright?" Homura was on her friend, hugging her as tightly as she could. Was she crying? "I feared I'd lose you!"

"I'm fine Homura-chan. You and Akemi-chan both protected me." She was surprised by Homura's display of emotion and by the familiar use of her name. Homura very rarely calls her by her first name only, always adding –san in a polite and distant manner. It felt strange, although it didn't last long before she returned to the cold girl she used to be.

"Where is Akemi-san?" she inquired, completely lost by the twists of the events.

Madoka pointed the doll house and when Homura turned around, she could see her twin rising to her feet among the wreckage. She was holding on a wall still standing, a hand covering her bleeding head. She looked really shaken.

Then, the barrier vanished once again. The witch had teleport out of harm's way from the group. Homura cursed under her breath. She really needed a grief seed soon. When she looked around where the redheaded girl stood earlier, the space was empty. She expected as much.

"Akemi-chan! Are you okay?" Madoka was already next to the injured girl, Homura closing the gap while throwing suspicious glares all around. The witch could come back, or that redhead. She didn't know which was worse.

Akemi fell to her knees and dispelled her purple outfit of a magical girl. "I'm feeling dizzy..."

"Seems like you hit your head pretty hard out there." Madoka tore a piece of her own magical suit to bandage Akemi's head before reverting back to her normal clothes to see if it would last. It didn't, so she tore a piece of her skirt and did the same with it.

"Seems like it. Can somebody tell me what happened? All I saw was that the witch was completely unaffected by Madoka's blast."

"And I didn't see a thing either."

The two Homuras turned to Madoka at the same time, waiting for an answer. "Hum... I ... don't really know... I thought I got it in with a full blast when Akemi pinned it, but it didn't work. And then Akemi was out, and everything was going so fast! The witch was really close, but there was an explosion... and I was in a bubble somehow... and then Homura.." She tried to piece everything together, but couldn't make sense of it all.

"The explosion was mine. The witch was going to eat you Madoka-san, and you didn't make a move to dodge it."

"And that was an orb, not a bubble!" Akemi was going well enough to start joking again. The gem from her ring flashed black a second, before returning to its normal purple shade. It didn't escape Homura's notice: Akemi was using her magic to regenerate as best as she could. But she wasn't Sayaka, and Homura doubted it would really heal anything.

"But why didn't the witch transform back into a girl?"

"Maybe because it was no girl, kiddy." At this moment, Masami walked out of the shadow of the large building, throwing nonchalantly a grief seed in her hand. "Never heard of familiars turning to witches?"

At the sight of the seed, Akemi exclaimed: "That's our grief seed! Give it back!"

Masami raised an eyebrow. "You failed to kill the witch. I don't see how this seed is yours."

"We fought hard to get it!"

"Wrong! You fought hard to _save that witch_. Am I right?" She thought that those girls' actions were so predictable. The pink girl suffered from a hero complex, and the two others were acting accordingly with the pink one, even though one of the two seemed like a veteran. Masami stared directly at Madoka. _Why are you so important?_ She thought. "Getting her grief seed was never in you intentions."

Madoka looked away from Masami's stare, ashamed that the criticism was directly addressed at her.

Masami , still playing with the seed, was going to had something, but before she could speak the grief seed suddenly stopped in midair, surrounded by a small transparent sphere and flew right into Akemi's hand.

Realising it immediately, Masami exclaimed: "Oh no you don't!" She materialized her flame whip and cracked it around Akemi's arm, trying to force her to let go of the seed.

There was a click sound and everyone stopped to look at Homura, who was pointing a gun at the older girl. "Stop now Hotaru Masami!"

"_You_ are threatening _me_?" She stood of all her might, the whip still around Akemi's arm. Next to her, the three girls looked like immature children fooling around. She gave to Homura that signature smile of hers. "You will really kill me? In front of that foolish friend of yours?" She was pointing at Madoka while saying that.

"No Homura-chan! Don't!"

"I will if you harm anyone." She didn't acknowledge Madoka's intervention.

"And I won't harm anyone if I get what is mine." She turned to Akemi, sitting on the ground, the arm burning only slightly. Obviously, Masami was restraining herself, or else that arm would already have turned to ashes by now. To Akemi: "So the decision is in your hand now. Either you give me that seed without fuss, or you keep it and I die. What do you chose?" Akemi didn't make a move to give the seed back, and Masami was slowly getting impatient. After a few seconds of stillness, seeing that she wouldn't give it back, Masami exclaimed: "I don't even get why you need Grief seeds in the first place! You have her," she pointed angrily at Madoka," to keep you human. Am I missing some important details, or are you just really greedy?"

That shocked the girls, and Akemi reluctantly let go of the seed.

"That's more like it." She was ready to leave, but stopped herself, remembering something. "You know, after I killed the witch I went back here to get your names and talk a bit. Since we were to hunt in the same city and stuff, but you kind of ruined my mood. I'm not sure I want to share this city anymore if it's to be with brats of your kind." Then she walked away, a sneaky Kyubey jumping on her shoulder when she was far enough from the trio.

When she wasn't in sight anymore, Akemi sighted in relief. "She's one scary girl."

"I can't stand her either."

"But now, the hunt was just a waste of time." She sighted again, this time adding despair and fatality to the mix of emotion she was going through.

Madoka resumed treating Akemi. "Don't mind her. We need to stop your bleeding... what's that? A burn?" She was looking at her arm, where the tissue had been ripped by the whip. The skin was unusually red. "You're coming home with me. We need to treat those wounds."

A tear or two rolled down Akemi's cheek, but she assured it was from the pain and the burn. She wiped away her tears and smiled to Madoka. "I have another idea. I'm bringing you to my place."

The world around the three girls waved in a strangely manner, forms shifted and the colors change to that of a beautiful garden of flower with a huge house in the background and the sun low under the horizon.

"What is this place?"

Akemi tried to stand up, smiling proudly of her work. "This is the place I wished for. This is my new house. We call it Eden." Still dizzy on her feet, she rested her arm around Madoka's neck for support.

Some lights were opened in the house, and from one of the windows, Madoka noticed movement. The next instant, Mitchiko opened the door. "Hi nee-chan!" When she saw that Akemi couldn't walk on her own, she grew worried. "What happened, desu-ka?"

"Don't worry Mitchiko." Said Akemi. "We'll tell you everything after I put some ice on my wounds."

Homura couldn't shrug off the memory of the fight with Masami. That girl was getting on her nerves. Worse, she was a threat. And the list of threat only grew longer by the day: Hotaru Masami, familiar witches possibly, Homura's lack of power, the executioners to come... and a dangerous lack of grief seeds. Oh, and she was ready to put Madoka in the mix too. Not to be mean, but because things always seemed to find their way to her and cause trouble. It was worrying.

What she didn't know was that the two other Puella magi in the house were going through the same thoughts. Under their smiles and cheers, each was extremely worried and scared, each for their own reasons, for their own point of view. They were so close, and yet they were far away, lost in their own silence.

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(||—||)

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Jyubey had seen it all. That was more information he had hope to get within that time frame; so much in fact that he pondered what he should tell and what he should hide to Umika. First valuable info: they were four magical girls now. Second valuable info: one of them was acting alone and couldn't stand the other three. Third valuable info: each of them was an irregularity. Which was weird to say the least.

A girl way older than the average, one that never contracted as far as Kyubey could tell, another that could vanish in plain sight with others, and finally a girl that couldn't kill a witch with a direct hit even though she had a despair potential unheard of. And that last one seemed to be the center of the irregularities.

That he could tell to Umika. What he couldn't tell her was that the pink one was here 'to keep them human'. What this meant exactly, he didn't know, and Kyubey refused to say anything on the subject. He'll just have to make sure she dies first. That should clear the irregularity.

But Jyubey didn't know he was watched too. Or he knew, but didn't think it meant anything. In the alley Masami had taken to leave the fighting scene, Kyubey stood, watching the roof from where Jyubey had witnessed everything. He was already planning one step ahead of his counterpart. His plan didn't involve the girls' death, nor their transformations into witches, which was a first on his part. No, he was basing his assumptions on a few words Homura told to Madoka once. Just a few words, and what he was doing now, no incubator had done it before. Jyubey couldn't understand the importance of it; he was merely an incomplete version of him after all.

But he could be manipulated. Everyone could be manipulated.

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(||/|\||)

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* * *

I had a hard time writing this chapter. I made an awful mistake this weekend: I read in one go all twenty chapters of Uzumaki manga. I needed to restrain myself to not writing anything about spirals (THEY ARE EVERYWHERE! AROUND US! IN US! MAD! MAAAAAD! DON'T READ UZUMAKI OR YOU'LL GET CUUUUURRRSSSEED BY THE SPIRAL!)

Well, as it turned out, I didn't write anything about spirals. Good. Just stay tuned for more. This story will captivate you just like the infinte curve of a spiral. (SPIRALS!)

I really need to stop with the spirals. Maybe I should switch to snail? (THEY ARE DEEELIICIIOOOUUUS! SPIRALS! SNAILS!)

Keep on reading! (MAAAAAAAD!)


	10. Chapter 10: Under the mask

Chapter 10: Under the Mask

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The three girls were yet again chasing another witch. Madoka shot the incoming familiars, covering Akemi as they came closer to the witch.

"Madoka-chan, I'm taking this one alone."

"What? But I can help! I can sav..."

"We really need grief seeds right now, Madoka-chan, so no 'buts'."

Madoka didn't protest and stayed back, occupying herself with the familiars instead. She wasn't pleased at the thought of killing the witch, but she knew better than to protest. She kept her pleas and sadness for herself, feeling she had failed once again the task she rendered possible with her wish.

Homura was a few hundred feet behind, her last rocket launcher already materialized. Because of the event of the other day, she couldn't bring herself to let go of this safety measure. Especially if they were fighting apart from each other.

Watching the fight, her thought wandered a bit on what Masami had said the previous day. '_You_ _have _her_ to keep you human'_. Was turning into a witch really a good idea? Of course not! What was she thinking!

On the other hand, she was useless right now. She couldn't fight at all after this last rocket, and her soul gem was still getting dirtier every day simply to allow her to use this body and to exist as a human. If she did nothing, she will only be a burden on the other two Puella magi since she would require seeds without being able to help for the hunt. And if she transformed, she could have another wish, maybe.

But she was Walpurgisnatch, and that thought alone frightened her to no extent. She was a monster, _the_ monster she was fighting since the beginning, _the_ monster that took Madoka's life in the first place, in this first timeline. An abomination that the mere appearance would cause hundreds of causalities. No, she could not become _that_. She will not become _that_.

But...

She didn't get the time to finish her reflection. Akemi had just killed the witch on her own. Before vanishing, the dead body looked more like a porcupine than anything else, glass needles covering it body whole. She bowed down and took the grief seed, the labyrinth slowly disappearing and giving way to the normal world and its own wonders of technology. She paused for some time, looking avidly into the black bead of despair, long enough that Homura started to fear she would use it only for herself.

But she didn't and came back toward Madoka and the veteran.

"A single seed. Let's make it worth it." She showed her soul gem in her open palm, quickly imitated by the other two girls. In the center of them three now shined dimly the three crystals.

They were all mostly shaded by shadows. Homura thought that hers was bad, but she was actually on par with the other two. "You two are over abusing your powers too much." Homura said, surprised showing in her criticism. "Especially you Akemi-san. It's been barely two days..."

"I know, I know."

"But I mean, what do you do to use so much magic in a single day?" Homura was really skeptical.

"And Madoka? How come she is as bad as me?" She asked, eluding the question.

"I think it's because it requires quite a bit of magic to turn a witch in a girl." Madoka explained. "I do in fact put more magic in my blasts since the event ... with Mami." As she explained this, she twitched on the last part. The wound of Mami's death, her second death at least, wasn't healed yet. "But that's for the blasts. The small arrows I use against minions are nothing in comparison."

"So you think you could slow down your use of magic like this?"

"If I only deal with familiars, yes. But..." She stopped midsentence, knowing her argument would not be received but still feeling really bad that she couldn't save anyone for the time being.

"Yeah, we know, Madoka-chan." Akemi said, putting a hand on her shoulder to comfort her. "But right now things are crazy, and the first priority is..."

"Grief seeds." She sighted. This argument would get her nowhere. She just needed to wait and resign herself to her fate.

Seeing that Madoka wouldn't bring that problem forth for now, Akemi returned to the subject at hand. "So, about this grief seed; I think we should split it between Madoka-chan and me, since we are the ones who do all the fighting."

Homura was shocked by the proposition. It was what she had in mind, but she wanted to propose this herself. The way Akemi put it it seemed more like she was saying: _Since you don't work, you don't get your share_. It was just rude; she should have proposed to share it between all three and then Homura would have refused her part.

"But Homura-chan's gem too is really dark."

"I'm fine Madoka-san." She was staring at Akemi and she swears she saw her sight in relief. The seed was shared between the two, and at all time Homura didn't stare away from Akemi. She was bothered by something, although she couldn't grasp what.

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(||—||)

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They parted their ways after the hunt at night. Akemi blinked to Eden with Mitchiko, Madoka went to her house, and Homura had nothing better to do than to go back too. She walked slowly under the lampshades of the street, thinking back on the recent events. So much in so little time! Was it really fine like things were? Were the smiles she saw on her friends' face really appropriate to those events? It had been merely two weeks since she had the luxury of seeing the sun of the 1st of May, and yet she didn't felt relieved at all. Nothing finished on that night of the Walpurgis. Despair just went on, following her like pest. And she couldn't spend an instant without thinking that a group of magical girls were coming anytime for their heads. Great!

When she arrived to her street she saw a police car parked on the way and two officers knocking angrily at her door. _Oh yeah, I used a gun in public a while ago_. She turned around and left the officers on her doorstep. Even if they broke in, they would find nothing relevant at all: only a few documents on witches they won't be able to figure any sense of.

Now, where was she to go?

Her feet got her to the park not far away from Madoka's home. There she found a somewhat comfortable spot, nice, tight, and sheltered from the wind. She couldn't bring herself to go knock on Madoka's door. Too many years trying to save others and you find yourself unable to accept help on your own. Maybe Akemi would shelter her, but she couldn't be contacted across dimensions.

Trying to fall asleep for many minutes now, she saw that a certain alien was observing her; for how long that she didn't know.

"What do you want, Kyubey."

"I don't want anything. I'm just keeping watch on my Puella magis, as this is my duty. It just so happens that right now you are in a position that allows no blank spot for me to hide."

_Stupid shitty alien! _She thought. "Well you are not doing you duty correctly. You can't keep an eye on Akemi as long as she's in that world of hers."

"Actually, I had a body come in it when Akemi contracted, so she is still under my supervision even there."

Homura cursed under her breath, low enough so that just she would hear it. "You stalker freak, spying on us just to better doom us!"

"I am not spying on any of you, for spying would imply using what I have collected against you or reporting to somebody else such information."

Homura rolled on her other side, trying to ignore that insolent dude to the best of her abilities. Who cares about the definition or the word 'spying'? So what if he can watch them and learn all of their secrets? None of them had much to hide anyway!

And then she thought about herself. What _was_ she hiding? She was hiding from Madoka, her feelings and details about herself; and she was hiding her own personality to appear as an unmovable rock.

What could Madoka be hiding? This took a bit more reflection on her part, but then she found some ideas. She could hide her sadness, knowing that grief seeds were the priority but feeling repulsed each and every time she sees a witch die. In fact, Homura knew this was the case. She could hide the wound made by Mami's death. She could be faking her friendship with both Homuras, not wanting to forgive them but unable to make any other move. This last one was pretty freaky and sent a chill down Homura's spine.

What could Akemi be hiding? When she thought about it, her doubts started to grow. Why was Akemi so aggressive against Masami? It was Akemi, not Masami, who started the hostilities yesterday. Why was she so absorbed today into that grief seed? Why had she been so rude?

Turning around once again, she noticed without surprise that Kyubey hadn't move from his spot. "You say you can watch Akemi right now?"

His ears twitched. "Of course."

"What is she doing?"

"Right now, she's looking at her soul gem, and she is talking to me. Or maybe she's just thinking aloud."

"What is she saying?"

"You are asking me to spy on Akemi?"

Homura turned around again. "Forget it." She didn't make a move for a few instants, seemingly falling asleep. A few minutes later she turned around again, anxious. "What is she doing now?"

Kyubey smirked.

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(||—||)

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Akemi was sitting on a comfortable couch, Mitchiko fast asleep with her head on Akemi's knees. The fireplace was bringing warm and comfort to the beautifully decorated room. This was all the comfort she could dream off, all the luxury that was within her reach. The wall of glass of the house gave sight to a sky of unnatural nebulas and to a full landscape of trees, flowers and animals. The night was calm, not a sound was heard in the room other than the occasional cracking noise of the fire. She was stroking leisurely Mitchiko's hair. And she was looking with an empty stare at her soul gem, half cleansed from the seed she shared with Madoka. From time to time, a tiny lightning of darkness passed in the shadowed half. Kyubey was laying on the other side of the table.

"What a waste."

"It is not." Her voice was calm and distant, maybe the effect all this scenery and comfort.

"You don't really need to expand your barrier this much. Why do you care so much about having a horizon or a few hundred pets?"

"They both contribute to the beauty of this place."

"I don't understand why you put so much importance on this concept of 'beauty'. You should focus more on efficiency instead."

She was still staring into her gem, looking at the strange reflections of the fire on its smooth surface as if hypnotised by it. She liked the feeling. "You would understand if you had emotions."

"I understand perfectly that you are wasting in vain your magic around when you could do things more meaningful with it."

"Like what?"

"Like dealing with more witches before needing to clean your gem. It is worth nothing that you need a grief seed every two days just to maintain a few miles of useless land."

"This is my world. I do what I want." She continued to stroke kindly the kid's hair and just to prove her words made a blanket appear out of nowhere to cover Mitchiko and herself. Staring back into her gem, she continued talking, kind of tired. "And what a place is this? It's nothing. It doesn't exist. It's just all an illusion. The real world is out there, ugly and sad, and I'm here, hiding in heaven where I'm God." Another small black lightning flashed for a second in her purple gem before reverting to normal. "There is no place for me in the real world of this timeline. I'm an irregularity, a double, someone that shouldn't be. There already was Homura, so why did I need to show up? What was it that put me here?"

"Coincidence. Fate. Luck. Madoka. Make your choice."

"Whatever it is, I don't care. I'm here, in the only place that belongs to me. Nowhere. I'm no longer belonging to any timeline, any reality except this void where I create all things. Even in this world, even if it is Madoka who brought me here, what use do I have? I'm a burden on everyone, and when things start to go bad, they rely on me to do all the work. I don't go to school, I can't see any friends and can't make any new either. I'm just a replacement, someone to do the hard job and to throw away when it's finished." She glanced outside the large window, looking at the paradise that was hers. "This is the only thing that I have; I'm not going to let it go." Her soul gem flashed again, catching her attention from the perfect scenery outside. "And then there is Mitchiko. What should I do with her? She too doesn't have any ties to this reality. So what now?"

Kyubey jumped down and rolled itself in front of the fire. "That's right. What now? What will you do next?"

"Do as I did today. Smile and go through with it."

"And for Jyubey's Puella magis?"

"I will protect Madoka like I promised to Homura — I'm sure you listened didn't you? —; I won't back up on my words. But I don't know what I will do after that. Maybe I'll just lock myself in this barrier, cut all links to reality, issue a rule that the barrier may never be altered on the inside and let myself turned into a witch? I don't know if I really care anymore. Life or death; it only has a meaning for those that have a reason not to die."

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(||—||)

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"Satisfied?"

Homura was completely shocked of what she just heard through the mouth of Kyubey. "You are lying!"

"We, incubators, don't lie."

"You're lying! This can't be true!"

"As I said..."

"You meant to tell me Akemi has suicidal thoughts? And she had them since when? It's been merely _two days_ she contracted!"

"I do believe those feelings were there, hidden, well before the contract. I believe she resents you for existing as _the_ Homura of this timeline, or maybe she resent herself for being the _other_ Homura."

"Shut up, and just go away!"

"The second one I can't do. But I will keep quiet if you ask."

And with this, Homura passed the whole night awake trying to make sense of what Kyubey had just told her. And her that thought everything was going just fine!

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(||—||)

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The morning came, cloudy and gray. Light slowly made its way into Masami's apartment. She was stealing it each night, the couple that lived here being absent for the week. When they will come back, it will be time for her to change spot, but for now she could enjoy a bed and a roof.

Kyubey had invested the apartment too, sleeping on the ground in a small ball of fur. Not that he really wanted to stay here — Masami had the bad habit of killing him as often as she smoked, which was to say a few time per day— but this girl's wish made him stay against his will. All he could do was to be the least of an annoyance as possible to avoid being killed to many times. Still, he had started to think of some ways to deal with this, but none of them would have served his purpose before the conflict with Jyubey was resolve. He just needed to bear with it for now.

Normally, this body would wake up with the dim light of the sun and would then watch over the lazy girl until she woke up, late in the afternoon. Not today. Today, something caught his attention before dawn. Every Kyubeys in the sector started to move at the same time, taking their respective position to cover every inch of the town. This one jumped on the window and tried to cover this area as best he could.

They were coming!

Somewhere else at the northern edge of the city, Jyubey was running, a dark object in his mouth. The preparations were almost ready. This was the last thing needed for the confrontation to take place. The desired location had been located some days ago; close enough to attract some attention, far enough that they wouldn't be able to make it in time.

As he ran, he was getting closer and closer to the desired part of the city. There, in the middle of the north park, where many people walked by every day. It would provide all the souls necessary to the creation of the witch. She was ready to hatch any second now; a fleeting wave of negative emotions would be just enough.

When he arrived, Kyubey was there, at the precise spot he had planned to drop the grief seed. They looked at each other, none speaking a word, each trying to figure out their own chance of success at this action. Then Kyubey made the first move. He nodded, acknowledging the challenge.

Jyubey dropped the grief seed to the ground.

Two minutes later, someone passed by the invisible seed. He was in a hurry, stressed about his work schedule and angry about his boss.

Just with this much, the seed exploded, and the man wasn't stressed anymore. He wasn't anything in fact.

As everyone else that happened to put a foot in the park for that matter.

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(||—||)

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Homura woke up, chills running down her back. She could sense the aura from where she was without making any effort to locate it. It was abnormal, too powerful.

She immediately stood up, cutting the pain of her stiff body from the rough night.

"Kyubey!"

The little dude was still there, looking in the direction the aura came from: north. "Yes"

"Tell Akemi we need her. Fast!"

He paused for a second, blinked, and then talked to Homura again. "I told her to meet you at Madoka's house."

Homura glared at Kyubey, a sinister thought forming in her head. "If this is your doing..."

"I didn't do anything." And this was the truth; he did not stop Jyubey from creating the witch.

She wasn't convinced, but quickly turned around to go meet Akemi at the pink girl's house. She had a bad feeling about this.

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(||—||)

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"I still don't understand your thinking." Jyubey was observing the majesty of the witch from within the labyrinth, trapped there like Kyubey. They were at a safe distance from the many familiars. Not like they would really get attacked or anything —familiars were feeding on grief and despair, both alien to the aliens— but they couldn't see clearly in the middle of all that agitation.

"You don't have to understand."

"It's not about your motivations, but I can't apprehend why you would put yourself in such a situation. If your girls manage to survive mines, then Hachibey will personally end you. And if they die, any plan with those irregulars will end with them. You lose in every case."

"You are seeing it backward. If you manage to kill them, then I get to live with the valuable knowledge I've gained. And if they live, then I don't have any care in the world what happen to me."

"Why?"

He didn't talk for some time, trying to put the information into a though that would be coherent to his counterpart. "Because this world will then become the seed to save all worlds."

Yes, a seed, exactly. Just like a grief seed, simply on a much greater scale. He was an incubator after all; he will just be the first to farm _worlds_.

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(||/|\||)

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I feel like I rushed this chapter a bit, like there is too much happening at the same time, but I wanted Kazumi and co. to make an appearance soon. If I listened to myself, I would put many more chapters before the encounter, but that would end up long and boring. So next chapter, you will get to see Kaoru, Umika and Kazumi. Promised!

Keep on reading, and post your reviews!


	11. Chapter 11: Let the Hunt Begin

Chapter 11: Let the Hunt Begin

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When Homura arrived at her house, Madoka was in the doorway, putting hastily her shoes in front of an impatient Akemi.

"Eh! Homura!" She called. "Ready to kick some butts this early in the morning?"

Homura stared hard at Akemi. Was all she saw yesterday through Kyubey's eyes just a dream, all fake? Or was she really that good to hide under a large smile, her glasses and sheer enthusiasm? And if this was the case, since when was she holding such an appearance?

Madoka just finished putting her second shoe on that they all left, running. Kyubey was running alongside Homura, which caught a suspicious glare from Madoka, but she didn't ask anything about it. Akemi did not fancy his presence at all.

"So, where is that witch exactly?" asked Akemi.

Kyubey answered her. "It's near the north park, a few miles from here."

"Huh, it will take a while to get there."

"Well then hurry up. People are getting eaten as we speak."

At the word 'eaten' Madoka suddenly stopped running at once, her eyes opened in fear and dread. She took her head in her hands, trying to prevent her thoughts from going toward _that_ day, _that_ event. Corpses, corpses everywhere! Empty beds filled with bones and blood; nurses fleeing from a swarm that was broking their limbs and devouring them alive; and the terrible fact that it was Mami who was the cause of so much blood, of so much death. She was trembling and mumbling to herself. "No! Not again! I don't want to see that ever again!"

"Madoka..."

"Eh! It's not by staying here that we will prevent... _that_...from happening! We should get going now. Homura?"

"Go ahead. I'll bring over Madoka when she'll calm down."

For a split second, Akemi's face twisted in something akin to anger and rage, but that face vanished immediately after and she brought back a smile on her face. "Okay then. Just don't take too long, or you'll miss the fight!" She then transformed and materialized her floating disk, and in an instant she was out of sight.

While she comforted Madoka on the fact that the past events were over, that the dead bodies were not real; she reflected on that glimpse of hatred she just witnessed. She never knew she could make such a face. And that scared her. More than anything, more than the terrible form of Kriemhild Gretchen or the lost of those she hold dear, it scared her. Could she really thrust Akemi? Could she become a danger later on? A threat?

It was at this moment that she realized that maybe, just maybe, Akemi wasn't _really_ her. That she, Homura, had never been the same Akemi as the one that just left. How much of a difference does it make when one of you fails at the ultimate test of self control? How much of a difference did it make that she surrendered all hope that one time?

It meant she was more emotionally unstable than her; and this, she recognized as an eventual threat.

That also meant that she never understood Akemi in the first place. And that thought alone was as terrifying as it could get.

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Akemi flew at high speed on her disk. She came closer to the north park, a place many used to jog, read and relax. It was a big place full of trees and grass and duck pools. Well, this was what she remembered of it. Right now, it had all been replaced with mirrors. Every object had been turned into a reflecting glass. Edges were reflected on every surface, making it extremely difficult to walk around the maze of this witch. She sometime thought a path open just to realise at the last second that her own distorted reflection was blocking the way. Colors were shifting; however she couldn't make sense of it at all. Was it a familiar? Was it the witch? Was it her own reflection?

At one point, completely lost, she heard someone call an attack some other place of this labyrinth. "TRUE SIGHT!" At this, every surface instantly turned to cold, gray stone, the mirrors being no more. Akemi noticed she was in a dead end, turning around endlessly for now a minute or two. She turned around to where the voice came and hurried. Was that another Puella magi?

Then she remembered, and she came to a halt. The executioners! They were here! They were in this barrier with her!

She hid, not knowing what to do. She could hear the noise of a battle and the screeching of the witch not far away. Should she go look, or should she wait for Homura and Madoka to arrive? How many were they? And how much time did she spent lost within the mirrors for that matter?

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(||—||)

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When Madoka and Homura entered the barrier, it was to put foot on a barren land of rock. Madoka was still tense, anticipating an encounter with flesh-eating monsters at any time now.

As they walked in what has been the park, they came across statues. Lots and lots of statues. And the strangest thing was that they all looked like mundane humans frozen in a variety of different poses. Some statues showed dynamic actions like running or throwing a ball; others were more static: someone here was laying down to look at the sun, another there reading a book. Even the trees were made of stones. It all gave this atmosphere something sinister, something dead. They took their weapons, gun and bow, in anticipation of an ambush of familiars. The fact that not a single minion showed itself did not help to reassure the two.

At each step they took, they made small cracking sound, breaking the fragile stoned grass. When they heard the sound of a fight, they both hurried, thinking it was Akemi fighting alone.

It wasn't.

The witch, a big humanoid creature with snakes all around, was desperately trying to escape from the combined fire power of three other Puella magis.

"PALLA DI CANNONE!" One of them kicked what appeared to be a soccer ball, throwing it on the witch like a canon bullet in a deafening explosion. Familiars were doing everything they could to push back the assault and protect the Medusa. The ground all around the fight glowed with sigils, and when Madoka made a step on them, she was unable to move her foot anymore.

_Binding magic!_ Homura thought. And surely those girls were...

"LIMITI ESTERNI!"

There was a large blinding flash, and then the witch dropped dead, a large hole piercing its head from side to side. The magical girl that delivered the blow was wearing a revealing dark outfit bearing similarities to those of the witches and warlocks of the old creepy legends. A large cross was her weapon of choice, only reinforcing the witch attire. There was a strange aura around that girl, one that Homura recognized immediately from experience. She wasn't safe. Her skin was meddling with her outfit in strange creepy ways, as if she was made of shadows. It didn't last long before the effect stopped, but what was seen could not be unseen. She was _creepy_. Homura didn't understood why she was so afraid from that girl, why her every movement seemed abominably dangerous, why terror caught her when she looked at her. It was... surreal.

Another girl, one that contrasted violently with the first by her nun outfit, looked in the direction of the two girls, still frozen into place by the spell. She too seemed utterly terrifying, with her double edge sword dripping of the unreal blood of the witch.

The nun turned around to face them, turning her weapon into a book and then opened it on an empty page before her. "Ex-fi..."

Before she could complete her spell, the floor change to a field of needles and the nun was forced to back away. Akemi made her appearance, a few orbs floating around her. "Homura-chan, Madoka-chan, are you okay?"

"Our feet are stuck!"

Akemi materialised a disk under them, separating the two girls from the magic circle on the ground. The nun wasn't impressed. She just stared right through them, a stare more deadly than that of the gorgon on the ground. Homura took her Beretta, knowing the battle was inevitable.

It was Madoka who spoke first. "Wait! Let's talk!"

"I don't think there is anything to talk about." It was the nun that spoke. "Unless you accept our terms of not using your powers anymore."

"And let ourselves turn into witches? Not a chance."

"So there is nothing to talk about." She looked at what she presumed was their leader, veteran and most dangerous enemy: Homura. "Don't you agree?... Akemi-san?"

Homura tightened her grip around her gun. They know! They know about them, but she didn't know a thing about those three executioners. Damn it, they were too far away for her to kill them in a single shot, and her ammunitions were limited. Akemi maybe?

"Umika, should we take their gem?"

"Remember we lost the freezer."

"You could make another seal."

"I could..." Looking around at the slowly dissipating features of the witch's lair, she made her mind. "but not now. Let's get this over with. DISPELL TRUE SIGHT!"

The crumbling maze turned back to mirrors, reflecting this enclosed space into infinity. With all the reflections and optical illusions going around, neither Madoka, Homura nor Akemi noticed that she had summoned a protective barrier around herself and her two allies. "Kazumi, finish this."

The one designated as Kazumi, the black wannabe witch, held her cross shaped staff in front of her. "LIMITI ESTERNI!"

_HOLY SHIT!_

It didn't hit directly the other girls. It didn't have to. They were in an enclosed mirror space after all.

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(||—||)

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The barrier broke from within with the sheer force of the spell infinitely reflected inside. Everything in it had been consumed by the sacrilege magic of Kazumi, all but the three girls in Umika's protective spell. Umika let go of the grief seed she had kept on her soul gem all along. This one protective spell had required such an amount of magic so as not to break.

Where stood Madoka's group, not a trace was left. The ground was smoking, grass and dirt burned with the leftovers of the spell that broke free from the labyrinth.

"Tsk. They escaped." Umika let herself return to casual clothes.

Jyubey came walking to them. "It was to be expected. I had told you about this one, the one that could walk between two dimensions."

"Yes, but you didn't have any knowledge that the other one, this Akemi girl, could protect herself under that shield of hers."

"She never used any magic in front of me, so obviously I didn't know."

Kaoru, not in her element in the schemes and plot Umika and Jyubey were sure to exchange from now on, asked: "So, now that we have frightened them, I don't think they will just come out and challenge us again for a while. Anyone's hungry from the trip?"

Kazumi cracked a grin. Umika just stared at her. _How can she think of such things in that kind of situation?_

"What?"

"I guess we could get settled." She said, reluctantly. Things were not done yet. Not until they catch those girls. "Kaoru, to answer your question of earlier, I think we should build another freezer. I would prefer if I didn't have to kill those girls."

"I agree. Can you cast the spell on something smaller? Like a backpack?"

"It's worth trying."

"But then what about the bodies?"

"Let's talk about it around some burgers shall we?"

As they left, so did a pair of eyes hidden in the shadows. It had seen the fight, looking straight through the layers of magic of the labyrinth as if it was mere glass. These girls... Irregularities... such a bother...

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(||—||)

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Madoka and company were laying on the ground, gasping for air. They had just managed to get away from the inferno that had become the witch's barrier thanks to Akemi. They were now catching their breath in Eden.

"Holy God! That was close!" Akemi exclaimed.

"They got us by surprise. Where did those mirrors came from by the way, Akemi-san?"

"It was the real form of the barrier, before she cast a spell that turned it to stone. At first, it was a real mess to walk around it, with all the reflections and stuff."

"The important is that we are safe."

None of them spoke for some time, calming down from the rush of adrenaline of earlier. The air was clear and cool and a light breeze rose, making the flowers all around dance in synchronism. _This is really soothing_, though Homura. She started to understand why Akemi didn't want to let go of this comfort, even though it used some magic. It was refreshing. And again, it was Akemi who saved the day. "I'm so useless..."

"Don't say that, Homura-chan! If you hadn't been there, Akemi wouldn't have had the time to close on me and save me. You saved my life!"

"I'm useless nonetheless. I have no fighting power. All I can do is to hide under a shield."

"Don't say that!"

"Homura, what if you started to use other types of weapon?" Akemi sat, looking at the thirteen year old schoolgirl with long dark hair.

Her eyes were half open, staring at the nebula that was the sky of this world. "I don't think I'd be able to use anything beside guns."

"What about cars?"

This surprised Homura. Daring to look at her double, she asked: "What about them?"

"Can you also keep them in your shield? For my part I never tried."

She looked back at the weird sky. "Yeah, I can. I didn't think about it much before..."

"But you did something similar?"

"I stole some anti-ship missiles from the JSDF to deal with the last Walpurgis night. Cars won't be a problem."

"I can see it from here: Homura, the girl who fights by summoning cars! You'll gain a reputation everywhere for being the only magical girl with vehicles as her weapon!"

This incredibly brought a smile on Homura's face.

"But does that means stealing the cars?" Madoka asked. "If we fight with them, they'll be completely useless after that."

"Hey, it will prevent pollution!" At that the three girls started to laugh.

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(||—||)

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—Today, at GHJ news.

In the past five days, the police received over a hundred complaints about lost or stolen cars. They go in all shape and size, and they disappeared anywhere in the Town. The police doesn't want to speak about it for now, but their main idea is that of a criminal gang or organisation that steals cars to sell them afterward. The investigators criticize this theory, saying that even a powerful organisation like the Yakuza can't make so many cars vanish in so little time without any witnesses, although they can't offer a rational explication either.

This case will probably join the files of the other mysterious cases that took place in the last two months. The gas break at the northern park the other day may also be included, for there was no explication about why the break happened in the first place. The list goes on with the sudden disappearance of the medical personnel at the Holic Hospital and the mysterious streak of girl suicides. Last of all; let's not forget what happened on April 30 and the peak of suicide and disappearance around that day.

Those events did not go unnoticed by the internet community. There has been a whole movement that emerged based solely around Mitakihara's streak of mysterious cases. Amateur ghost catchers and investigators came from all around to try their luck at...

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(||—||)

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A few days after their first encounter with the three foreign Puella magis:

There was a big crash sound, followed by an explosion and witch's screams. "Another one down!" Akemi was jumping around, happy that they could have killed yet another witch.

The witch's barrier was filled with about half a dozen cars, most of which had exploded. "It's weird, but it works."

"You're doing great Homura-chan!"

"Yes, but I still need your help to pierce the fuel tank with your needles."

"You don't need me! Hey, you were awesome out there when you made that car levitate and threw it again and again on the witch! You looked so cool!"

"I still prefer explosions..."

All to their talk, neither Homuras noticed that Madoka was silently crying. They had managed to kill three witches in the past days, and did so with much more efficiency than they did before. But each time, Madoka just watched the two girls end the live of what could have been a young child or an innocent girl. Each time she stood, quiet, not preventing those murders from happening. They needed grief seeds, they say. They needed practice, they say. So she didn't say a thing herself, and bore her own pain alone each and every time. With every witch, she felt like she was punching herself, harming herself, punishing herself for her inaction. And it became worst and worst every time. Was she doomed to passivity? Was it her malediction for the wish she made?

She swept her tears before her two friends noticed anything.

And then Homura did an about-face, a gun materialized and pointed at a garbage can. Behind it was Jyubey. Madoka, all to her own thoughts, did not hear the alien coming. "Greetings, ladies." He didn't make a move to hide from the weapon aimed at him.

"What do..." A shadow caught Homura's attention. Of course! He wouldn't come alone! She then switched her aimed at the corner of the building, where the shadow still stood in the setting daylight.

"You are so noisy, attracting attention on yourselves." Umika revealed herself from the dark of the building in slow, deliberate movements, Kaoru just behind her. Kazumi was nowhere to be found. "You know they talk about you on the news? Like all those stolen cars for example..."

"Shut up."

She looked at Homura and the threatening gun. Materializing her double edge sword, she took a fighting stance, all emotions draining from her traits. She didn't add anything. It would just be a waste of time.

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(||/|\||)

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* * *

OPEN EPIC STYLE!

So, ..., what to say? That Homura is now a badass with weird improvised weapons? That she can fight at all now? That everything is going to end with flowers and sugar (and cake)? You can beleive that if you want; it'll just all the more fun to destroy, bit by bit, right until the end.

(Now is a good time for evil laugh but I'm unable to write those, so please fill the blank with what comes to your mind.)

On another note, I'm entering the fall of this story. I'm about 2/3 finished, so I expect to write 5 or 6 other chatpers all in all. This is already way longer than what I had in mind, but seeing as things go, I may not be able to cover everything in just 5 chapters. I find that the more I write about this fiction, the more ideas I get. Unfortunately, I need to stop somewhere.

Stay tuned, post your reviews, dance, whatnot? I just hope you're enjoying your reading.


	12. Chapter 12: The Cor of the Problem

Chapter 12: The Cor of the Problem

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Sounds of clashing combatants were heard that night. With the legends that were running around on Mitakihara right now, it was just a matter of time until the population claimed to have heard ghosts. The rare few that had watched the fight questioned their own sanity and were not taken more seriously than all those mystery hunters roaming around. The fight had been quite chaotic.

As soon as the fight started, Kaoru kicked a soccer ball at the three girls, creating a crater as they barely managed to escape the blast and the debris. Still in midair, Homura tried to land a few shots on her only for the bullets to be deflected by Umika's barrier. Not wanting to waste her ammunitions in vain, she stored back her gun and readied herself to switch to cars as soon as she landed. Kaoru was on her before that.

Umika on her part started without any hurry, looking at her two opponents. "Rosa Fantasma!" In the next instant, a handful of other Umikas appeared next to the first one.

"Hey! No fair! It's six against two!"

"I don't recall saying anything about fighting fair." Five of the six Umika jumped towards the two girls, double swords readied, while the last one was left for support.

Akemi and Madoka stood back, intimidated by the number of opponents. Shrugging off the odd feeling, Akemi summoned a field of orbs in front of her, only waiting for the clones to come in to turn it into a deadly field of thorns. Madoka raised her bow, but didn't get any opportunity to shoot. A lightning stroke the ground right between her and Akemi.

"Madoka! Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. The clones!"

This moment of inattention allowed the Umikas to cross the field of orbs unarmed. The one at the back also took the opportunity to learn more about her opponent. "Ex-file!"

Akemi fought back, using shields and needles to defend against her five opponents. She noticed words, or more precisely sigils, escaping from her and being absorbed by the book. It was painless, but she still worried of what effects it could have on her other than that. But one thing at a time. Right now, she was busy dealing with five double sword wielders.

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(||—||)

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Homura was watching her two friends' battle from a corner of her eyes. Kaoru kept her busy on her end, and even though she really wanted to turn the table and go help Akemi, she was just slowly getting pushed away by the brute strength of her opponent.

"Hey! Fight me seriously!"

Kaoru went to kick Homura in her stomach with her spiked boots, but at the last second a car appeared between the two, acting like a shield. It took the blow. Hard. The metal twisted and ripped as if it was paper. Kaoru, since the beginning, was careful not to get trapped in the framework of the vehicles. If she didn't remove her foot fast enough, she would have a hard time freeing herself afterwards.

"I am fighting seriously." She said, in her low tone, glancing still at Akemi and Madoka.

"No you're not! You're just hiding under stolen cars!" She pushed the debris in the purple girl's direction with all her might. Homura stepped aside, right into Kaoru's follow up.

"Stay focused on me!" She was going for a high kick.

Suddenly, the same debris that were thrown toward Homura came back to Kaoru, a purple aura around them. Surprised, she changed the trajectory of her kick to it, which did not prevent her from getting many cuts from the scrapped pieces of metal. Her arms and her leg already started to heal, the deep cuts stopping bleeding in an instant. "You can regenerate that?" Homura asked, the rests of the car still levitating at her touch.

Kaoru laugh, taunting. "Does that mean you can't?"

And the second round started.

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(||—||)

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Completely shocked and surprised by the lightning, Madoka looked in all direction to find the source of this attack. She was sure it was the third girl, the one that dressed as a witch, although she was nowhere near.

"Madoka! She's on the roof at 7 o'clock!"

Tuning around in said direction, she pulled the string of light of her bow, five arrows materializing on it. Runes flowed from the arrowheads, locking on their moving black target. She released the string, and pulled immediately again, making side steps to avoid the struggle between Akemi and the Umikas.

The first wave of arrows missed the black Puella magi as she leaped in the airs. Her ear bell illuminated as electric sparks ran from her torso up to her arms and shot strait up into the sky in a reverse thunderbolt. The next instant, a lightning struck a lamppost next to Madoka, some hundred feet away from Kazumi. Another wave of arrow lost itself around her. She was too far away for the girl to target accurately. But she couldn't land a blow of her own either. Well, you get nothing without breaking eggs, right?

She started to jump from roof to roof, closing the gap between her and the melee but still being careful to not give any line of sight to the archer girl. Arrows were flying close, coming from below and skimming the edges of the roofs. She threw some lightning of her own, none of which hit. Close enough to be within melee reach if she just jumped down, she stopped in a dead angle to think. Should she go with her cross, or continue to use Saki's magic in the form of electric whips, _Pietra di Tuono_? And how should she jump down without getting shot outright? With Umika's barrier?

All to her thoughts, she didn't realised Madoka had jump on the other side of the roof, doing a large detour to stay out of sight. _Sorry, I'm terribly sorry, but I must do it_. She held her bow, slowly as to not attract her attention and as the girl was about to jump down, shot a single, precise shot right through Kazumi's heart.

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(||—||)

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Akemi had succeeded eliminating two of her six opponents. Large groups were vulnerable to attacks covering a large area, and that's exactly how she used her orbs. But now, the remaining four were even more coordinated and somehow managed to dodge all of her attacks, as if they were reading into her mind. After multiple feints from both sides, a first stroke broke her defence and pierced right through her shoulder.

Akemi gasped in choc, unable to concentrate on anything but the pain. And then there was another explosion of pain in her stomach, and she couldn't help but scream in agony. It was too much; this girl was too much for her.

A car unexpectedly came crashing its way on the Umika that was currently stabbing Akemi, the clone disappearing under a ton of steel. The double edged sword moved around in the wound, and Akemi couldn't bear it, she couldn't stand the pain.

So she cut it out. And the pain disappeared.

She could now think and see clearly. Two Umikas out of three were close to her, but were looking toward Homura, thinking the girl on the ground was no longer able to fight. On her part, Homura was trying to get closer to her, but her opponent didn't let her. Looking at herself, she noticed that she was bleeding severely and probably had a damaged organ or two, but this body could bear it. Well, that what you have to believe anyway, since thinking the opposite won't bring you anything. Anyway, she couldn't do anything about it for now. So she concentrated on the two girls next to her. If nothing was done, Homura would soon find herself against four opponents instead of one!

Before they could step out of her reach, Akemi grab the two of them and then vanished from this world. The lone Umika that was left faded into nothingness, her true self no longer around to give her magic and substance.

This last action received a scared look from Kaoru. "Where did they go?" Homura did not answer, too preoccupied by the results of the battles to give anything away. They were losing. She herself had suffered some broken bones from a connecting kick or two. Cars filled the alley around them, total wrecks and useless bunch of scrap now. They were completely ineffective against this brute girl, this Kaoru.

And she was getting worried about Madoka. Where was she?

She continued to throw glances around all the while summoning two mini-vans, each levitating at the touch of her hands, and smashing them around without any apparent effort. Kaoru's body took a dark taint, reinforced enough to stand toe to toe with her opponent's intimidating weapons. She was punching and kicking her way toward the purple girl, smashing cars in order to get to her. Homura threw one of the two cars only for it to be dodged by Kaoru. Quickly taking out a gun, she shot the fuel tank of the car she just threw.

The blond girl disappeared in the explosion that followed. Homura made a few steps back to avoid the flames and waited to see the result of her last attack, but when the smoke settled down, the other girl was still standing, a grief seed in her hand.

"... Is that... all you've got...?"

_Is there no end to her?_

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(||—||)

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Umika saw her surrounding being warped and distorted as she was forced to leap across dimensions with Akemi. When it settled down, she was in a field of flowers under a sky looking more like mixed paint than a real sky. Both of her selves turned to the girl with glasses that was holding their feet.

"You are still able to move after that blow?"

"Not really. But now, I'm safe. The fight is over."

"Why is that?" She dispelled her other self and poke the girl's arm with her weapon. It didn't do anything, not a scratch, neither pain nor any wound whatsoever.

"Here, you can't hurt me."

Umika thought a bit at this statement. "But I can still steal your gem."

Akemi blinked. She hadn't thought of that. "But then you'll get trapped here forever."

"I don't think this place will sustain itself if you're no longer there, for one thing, and even if it does, I'll just have to break through with the proper counter spell."

_What, is that even possible?_ The nun was slowly getting closer, her hand stretched toward Akemi's soul gem, on her hand_. No, get away from me! Wait, concentrate..._ "I order that you cannot come closer than twenty feet from me."

Right after this, the space between them both lengthened to the ordered distance, much to Umika's surprise. She tried making a few steps toward the purple girl on the ground, but even though she passed many flowers, she couldn't seem to get any closer. "Tsk, what a cheap trick." She just sat on the ground, looking at Akemi, and reverted to her normal clothes. She only kept her magical book, opened to the page where Akemi's thoughts laid on paper. "I'll just have to break through myself." And absorbed herself in reading.

Akemi couldn't do any more than that, and feeling she was about to lose consciousness, she ordered one last time. "I order that my wounds would heal." A halo of light enveloped her as she fell asleep.

The last thing she saw was a worried Mitchiko running her way with a rabbit in her arm. Cute sight...

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(||—||)

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Kazumi was staring at the girl that just shot, noticing just now her presence; but the biggest surprise was where the shot hit.

She had nothing. Not a single scratch. She touched her breast to check. No wound whatsoever.

"That can't be!?" Madoka pulled her string again, materializing a full set of arrows and striking once again.

The five shots landed. Nothing.

Kazumi started to laugh, relieved. "I don't know what's happening, but this makes things way simpler."

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(||—||)

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"Is that even possible?" Jyubey asked, looking away from the fight. "For a Puella magi to be unable to arm anyone I mean."

"It doesn't surprise me."Kyubey answered. "Madoka is a pacifist at heart, and made her wish in that sense. Even though she made her mind to shoot, I suspect she didn't have the resolve to kill yet, and maybe never will. That's why her magic doesn't do anything; because she really doesn't want anyone to die."

"With this, I think it is settled. There is no way your Puella magis can win against mine."

"We'll see. Anyway, I'm fine with both alternatives."

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(||—||)

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Madoka shot another time, a larger shot that engulfed completely Kazumi. The girl simply walked right in it, toward Madoka. "Don't come close to me!" Crept out, she started to run away, jumping down from the building and trying to make it back to where Homura and Akemi were fighting earlier.

Kazumi quickly followed. "Don't think badly of me. It's not like we were going to kill you or anything." As she talked, she used yet again Saki's lightning magic to increase her body functions, her ear bell shinning dimly of the borrowed magic. Each stepped she took was longer and faster than the previous one, and in no time she had cached up to the pink girl. They were now in sight of Homura and Kaoru. She pushed her to the ground, forcing her to a halt. Standing atop of her, she placed a leg on Madoka's right arm and held the left one firmly. "I'm sorry, really, but this is for your own good." She reached for Madoka's soul gem, under the scream of the poor little girl.

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There were three clear shots. Looking up, Madoka gasped in horror at the sight. The black girl's eyes lost any focus as she fell, all life remove from her traits. The first shot had ripped the left half of her neck. The second hit was higher, just higher, and had exposed the bone of her jaw naked. The third shot was still higher, and had hit its target: the shinning ear bell.

She collapsed over Madoka, who pushed the dead body aside, refraining from throwing up at what she just saw. Any noise of bended metal and crashing sounds had also stopped.

"Kazumi..." Kaoru couldn't believe it. Kazumi had died. And Umika was in another dimension. What had happened?

Homura turned her gun toward Kaoru, but she didn't seem to notice. She started to walk strait toward the body laying on the concrete, the magical clothes of her friend turning back to the white, pure casual dress she was wearing before.

But then something strange happened, which caused Kaoru to stop.

Even though Kazumi was dead, her chest rose, in a kind of abnormal way, before settling down, and rose again in a much more violent spasm than the last.

All three girls were confused about what was happening. _Didn't I just hit her soul gem? _Thought Homura. _She should be a corpse by now..._

Kaxumi's body was arching as if something was pushing from the inside of her ribcage to get out. Something was trying to get out of her!

And then there was a cracking noise and the body fell to the ground, inanimate. Above it floated a heart. A large, black heart surrounded by chains. As soon as it was freed from its envelope, magic started to erupt from it, spreading in all shapes and colors in the area they were in. The witch's labyrinth was forming.

Homura, not wasting any time in useless speculations, fired at the pulsating thing, but the few shots passed right through it, as if it was just a mirage of some sort. The witch didn't yet have any consistence in the physical world. But it didn't take long that it took an elongated form, rising strait up to the sky, surrounded by a field of twisted thorns.

"The Cor maleficus..." Kaoru was too shocked to move. The witch's appearance was the same as that of Michiru Kazura. This had an odd feeling of nostalgia, and sadness. And terror.

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"Too bad." Commented Kyubey at the sight of the Cor maleficus awakening into a witch. "I still wanted to experiment a bit more on her before her death. We could have gain precious knowledge."

"You wanted to see if she could contract again, even though she was already a Puella magi?"

"You though the same thing at one point or another, didn't you?"

The black Jyubey moved his stance a little. "I'll admit I was curious. But this is already a good deal of information."

"We both knew what was going to happen the moment you saw the way they proceeded to the resurrection. All they did was to lock the Cor into a container that happened to resemble a human being. The Cor gave it life and magic, the seal gave it a form and a personality. When the seal is gone, all that's left is the Cor."

"I knew all that, but seeing it with my own eyes confirms the hypothesis." Jyubey watched back at the scene down there. "I wonder if this knowledge has any potential for the Project..."

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(||—||)

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Madoka watched as the monster materialised itself in its labyrinth of thorns. Without a second thought, without any joy in her slow movements, she took her bow.

"Madoka, don't do it." Homura put her hand to lower her weapon. Madoka clenched her teeth and made a side step to put the witch back in her line of sight. Homura just followed, placing herself right in front of her. "Stop. She's the enemy."

"I've had enough!" Madoka screamed, all the pain she had kept in for the past weeks breaking free and emerging at the same time. "I've had enough to just keep still, not doing anything while I actually have the power to save lives! You think it's easy to just stand there and watch you and Akemi kill witch after witch knowing they are exactly like you and me? You think it's easier on me if you're the one who does all the killing and murdering? Well, you're wrong! I kept shut all that time even though I thought it was abominable. I didn't say a thing! But now I can't take any of this anymore! Friend or enemy, I don't care anymore. All I want is for that girl to live. So stand aside and let me do what I couldn't do because of you!" Midway through her tirade, tears made their way to her eyes, tears of pain and silent suffering.

The reaction of Homura surprised Madoka; she grabbed her in a tight hug and whispered to her ear, the voice full of emotion. "Why do you always want to be a hero?... Why can't you think about yourself for once?" Her voice was breaking with sobs, culpability showing through every word. "I'm sorry... sorry... so so sorry... but please... Madoka... bear with it. We'll go through this together... please... and I promise you... one day, I'll make you happy... Truly, perfectly happy... We will earn our happy ending, even though we need to go through such hell to attain it... So please, for you... for me... bear with it." She was holding Madoka's head in her hands and laid forward until their forehead touched. This was as close a she was ready to go, as much as she was ready to show her affection for Madoka. She could just close the gap between the two and kiss her — they were soooo close— but couldn't bring herself to do it. She was afraid of making this step, afraid to face Madoka afterward, afraid that this would destroy their friendship forever.

So she stepped away, and turned to the witch, leaving behind Madoka dumbstuck by her display of emotion. Turning around one last time, she smiled. "One day, I promise."

Then she took out her last rocket lunched, and turned back to the witch. And she fought alone. All alone, like always...

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(||/|\||)

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Warning. I won't update next Thuesday. I need to take it off to study a bit for school exams. The fact that I also work part time every weekend doesn't alow me any free time either this week. Not like waiting a week to get the update will kill you, unless you grew adicted to fast-pace writing...

So post comments, and you'll see me again next week!


	13. Chapter 13: Incubators

Chapter 13: Incubators

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A day later, at the breaking of dawn, the park where Homura used to wait for Madoka was empty. No one was waiting. What would they wait for anyway? Madoka had refused to participate in any hunt whose goal was to collect grief seeds anymore, so there was no reason for Homura to wait there.

Because of that, no one saw a small hole in space, about the size of a thumb, slowly stretching and opening. When the hole was big enough, a hand came out of it and grabbed the edge of the hole, pushing against it to make way for a second hand, and a foot. The hole continued to stretch under the constraint, and soon it was big enough for a body to escape from it and crash to the ground. No longer being forced open, the hole immediately closed itself and disappeared.

Umika rose to her feet and shook her clothes to remove the dust and the sand that got in in her fall. She was exhausted, having spent the last day in constant concentration to pierce a hole in this other worldly dimension. Now that she had succeeded, she still needed to get back to the hotel they stayed in, Kaoru Kazumi and herself for the time being. But right now, she had absolutely no idea where she was.

"Jyubey! Can you hear me?" There was no immediate response, so she took out her cell phone and called Kazumi. After waiting through a few ringtones, she decided to try Kaoru instead. This time, she answered immediately.

"...Yes?" Her voice sounded tired, even though it wasn't dark yet.

"Kaoru, it's Um..."

"UMIKA! ARE YOU OKAY? WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? I WORRIED I HAD LOST YOU TOO..."

"I'm fine, don't worry." _She's been crying and waiting for me to return? _At the other end of the phone, she heard soft cries and sobs, probably of relief. "I'm fine, you can stop crying now. I made you two worry for nothing didn't I?"

"... *sob* Umika... *sob*..."

"Can you pass me Kazumi? I too was worried about you two."

"... Umika... *sob*... Kazumi... is dead..."

The smile she had of hearing her friend's voice vanished. Did she hear correctly? "Kazumi is, what?"

"SHE'S DEAD! THAT AKEMI BITCH SHOT HER SOUL GEM, AND THEN SHE TURNED INTO A WITCH AND THEY KILLED HER!"

Umika didn't speak for a while, digesting this terrible news. She didn't notice that Jyubey had found her and was standing a few meters on her left, in the middle of the street.

"... *sob* ... Umika?..."

"I'm here." Saying a full sentence was painful. It meant she needed to focus on what she was saying, and by extension, on what she thought. "I'm coming to see you." Her voice sounded far away, like echoes of reality she couldn't quite grasp. "Can you tell Jyubey to come here, so I know where to go..."

"I'm already here."

She turned toward the street, looking at the black and white alien. Its form was kind of blurry; maybe it was because her eyes were full of tears. "Kaoru, I'll be there soon. Wait for me."

"..."

She closed her phone and walked toward Jyubey, but the little guy didn't make any move to get going. He was just looking at her, trying to figure out something.

"In which direction is the hotel?" she asked, walking a few steps in a random direction pass Jyubey.

"Are you okay, Umika?" He sounded concerned about her, but if he was it wasn't for the reasons she could believe.

"Yeah, I guess."

"Can you continue to fight?"

She looked at him, bewildered. "Can't I have any rest? Kazumi died! Don't you think it's more important than going back against those girls?"

"Puella magis die all the time; I don't see why her death should have more importance than any other's."

"Well it is important! For me! For Kaoru! We were close friends, so it's normal that we are shocked and that we need some time to mourn her death!"

"Just so you know, the other girls against whom you fought are on the verge of turning to witches themselves."

This sudden change of subject had the effect of turning Umika's attention away of Kazumi for a few seconds.

Jyubey continued. "Each of those three girls will turn into a kind of witch you have never seen in your life." He said, walking closer to her. "Do you know about the Walpurgisnatch?"

Umika froze in fear at this mention. She had known about this legend, and the word came up again when she read the purple girl's thought, but she didn't mind it at that time. "The witch that comes once every few hundred years, that doesn't need to hide behind a barrier and that is so powerful that her mere appearance would cause hundred of causalities?"

"You are quite knowledgeable. Yes, that witch." He paused, looking at the trembling girl in front of him. Without the glass, frightened and exhausted, she looked pitiful. "Well, you see, both Akemi and the other purple girl will become Walpurgis if they are allowed to awaken. If this happens, Mitakihara will be wiped out of the map."

"How... is that possible?... how can those two become such a powerful witch?..."

Jyubey tilted his head on the side, pushing his argument a bit more to make Umika understand the seriousness of the situation. "You think that's bad? The pink girl is even worse off. Her despair potential is such that if she ever turns into a witch, this whole planet would cease to exist in a matter of hours. Walpurgis is harmless in comparison."

She was now staring him with eyes wide opened, shaking from every limb of her body. "Why... Why didn't you tell us any of this before?"

"Because I had faith that you could deal with those girls easily."

She made a few steps back, and stumbled and fell on the sidewalk. She tried asking another question, but not a sound came out of her mouth.

"Actually, I don't mind it if Akemi and the other one turn into witches, but I can't let the pink one transform yet, and allowing either one to turn into a witch would guaranty that the pink one would soon follow." He jumped on her and stared directly in her eyes, the proximity giving even more presence to his voice. "She is the one that caused those entropic bursts. I fear that this ability, whatever it is, gets passed to her witch form. If this is the case, that witch would end up increasing entropy so much that it would be irreversible. We can't afford to take this risk, you understand?"

She took a long time to put enough order in her thoughts to reply. "So... you are asking me... to save the world?"

"No less. That's why I needed to know: can you keep on fighting?"

She nodded. What else could she do in such a situation?

Jyubey jumped down and started to walk toward the north, in the direction Umika could only guess was where the hotel was. "Just to let you know, the house a few blocks from here is the house of the pink girl, Madoka. They often come here as a meeting place."

Umika looked in said direction. Among the many houses she could see, one of them was home to a monster. She shivered at the thought, and quickly followed Jyubey. For the first time in her journey, she realized that losing was not an option. She could feel the pressure resting on her shoulder, the stress of the new revelations clouding her mind. She needed rest.

But she was unable to close a single eye that night. And an unexpected guess did not hep either...

.

(||—||)

.

Kyubey watched as the young girl he just contracted with shot herself a bullet in the head to escape from her tormentor. He didn't particularly enjoy telling them the truth and breaking their mind like this, but it was efficient on the long term. At least, for weak girls like her that is.

Her soul gem rolled out from her hand toward a corner of the room. It came to a halt when it came into contact with another pair of paws, hidden in the shadows.

"Still the same ugly techniques as always, as I can see, Kyubey." The other incubator lowered his body to take the soul gem in his mouth and walked slowly toward Kyubey. His eyes of two different colors were all that gave way of his presence for now.

Kyubey turned to his not quite unexpected visitor. "She believed she could become a ghost that way. I don't understand why humans would throw their life away just to be part of some myths." He looked back at the body of what has been an enthusiastic ghost hunter only recently attracted here to investigate Mitakihara. He had immediately noticed her potential, and her weakness. She took those rumors seriously. So seriously in fact that she was mocked by the other peoples of her group. When he proposed his deal, she wished to prove everyone that ghost truly existed. What a foolish soul... He was just at the part of telling her that the gem was her soul when she decided to end her life. "Was this girl's wish that brought you here?"

"Coincidence."

"Fate."

"The job." The shadow of the new incubator was bigger in the evening light than that of Kyubey; at least twice as big. It still had the characteristic feline shape, with the distinctive long ears and the fluffy tail, but he was more slender, giving off the presence of a predator. The two side by side were as different as a kitten and a lynx. "You know why I'm here."

"I do. So do I get a warning for not applying to the rules, or something along those lines?"

"Jyubey gave you the warning. It wasn't enough it seems." His eyes flashed in the darkness, one of a sapphire blue and the other of a fiery red. "This is your ultimatum. If your girls are not disposed off in the next day of this planet, I will dispose of them myself." He took a few steps forward, towering Kyubey from his height. Leaving the concealment of the shadows, he reveled himself properly. The left side of his body was of a light cyan with the red circle of the incubator on his flank, while his right was red with a blue circle instead. The colors of his eyes were opposite to the side they matched.

Kyubey bowed before this figure of authority. "I understand, Hachibey." The warning was very clear, even though unspoken. It said _If I ever need to get involve, you're dead!_

Hachibey stared at this impudent little being, looking through his flesh and into his very soul with his cold blue eye. What he saw there wasn't obedience, like he would have thought, but superiority, determination and absolute resolve. This ultimatum was useless; Kyubey would never budge from his position. Waiting another day was just a loss of time.

So he walked away, the soul gem still in his mouth. "I'm taking this with me."

"Still the same ugly ways as always, as I can see from you too, Hachibey."

The blue and red incubator didn't answer to that.

.

(||—||)

.

Homura had been hunting in the meanwhile, her soul gem held before her in a familiar fashion. She was brooding on her thoughts, but it always came back to the same two things: Madoka crying and Akemi hurt. This was all that had happened since she had overcome the Walpurgis night. How much longer would it continue?

She had been walking for an hour or so when she located the presence of a witch, but when she arrived at the location she found Masami and no witch. The two exchanged a look and parted their own ways, not saying a single word. Obviously, she too needed grief seeds, and for the past days Homura's group had been collecting them like crazy. So she guessed there would be no grief seed for her tonight.

Putting a hand in her pocket, she touched the one that had drop from the black girl's witch. She still couldn't understand why she turned into a witch in the first place, especially in such a gruesome manner. Maybe she was an irregular Puella magi, like the rest of them?

The grief seed was still unused. She had seen Akemi take heavy injuries, and she feared it would require too much magic to heal. Her own soul gem was dark, and Madoka's was too mostly from her outbreak of emotions back then, but Homura couldn't bring herself to use the seed without making sure Akemi was okay. She had asked Kyubey to keep an eye on her, and to tell her when she would wake up. There was nothing else they could do for now.

She entered her house and closed the door behind a little white alien. In the last few days, she had gotten accustom to Kyubey's presence; so much that she didn't really care about it now. He didn't do anything harmful, and was a much needed communication link between her and Akemi when she was in Eden. So, he was allowed to stay.

She changed to her pyjama and collapsed on her bed. And then she stared at the ceiling. Madoka crying, Akemi hurt. Always those two pictures looping in circles in her head, hunting her when she closed her eyes. She was tired, but couldn't bring herself to keep her eyes shut long enough to fall asleep.

After an hour or two, knowing that sleep would not come, she got up and opened the lights. She needed to know the measure of her own power right now, of how much protection she could offer to Madoka and Akemi. She didn't want the same things as before happening again; Madoka crying, Akemi hurt. Always and always...

_Stop! Focus!_

She made her shield appear and materialised all the weapons in it, including the cars one by one, and did an inventory of what she had. It wasn't much. It really, really wasn't much.

Beside 39 cars of all size and colors, she had only the half emptied Berreta that she once used against Jyubey. No more rocket launcher, no more grenades, no more handguns beside this last one.

Seven shots. That's all that was left. Seven.

She then contemplated her shield. And she looked at it for a long time.

The shield itself was a weapon. It could freeze time and allow her to go steal the ammunitions she needed like she did so many times before. But it all came at a cost. For that, she would need to rewind time again. And leave Madoka behind.

"Are you leaving?" Kyubey asked, looking expectantly at her.

For all answer she gave him a quick glance before staring back at her shield.

"It would solve most of your problems right now."

"Maybe... I don't know. I don't know much anymore..." Her voice was hollow, emptied of all emotion; even the indifference had left. "If I go back, history will get worse and worse every time." She stared at the empty compartment of the round hourglass, the one where a month worth of sand could flow from, the one that was the source of her power; empty. "And... I don't know if I actually have the motivation to stand again, to continue this... struggle." She made everything in her house disappear except for the shield and the gun, both laying on the ground before her. "I don't know if I can go through that again."

"But you know what happened." Kyubey said, of his high pitched voice. "You know how things would turn out. You could arrange to save Mami. You could prevent things from going awry. You wouldn't be powerless anymore. And you could deal with Jyubey's girls before they even had any time to react. So why are you hesitating?"

Sitting against a wall, she stared at the wide emptiness of her room. No more couches, no bed, no fridge. Only a shield, and a gun. Two very drastic options, and a third one of not actually doing anything. "I don't know. Maybe it's because this world offered me something new..."

"What is it?"

"...Hope..."

"Hope?"

"It's hard to explain..." she took some time to understand the concept herself, and then shared her thought. "It's like as long that there is a shred of hope, a small possibility that things can get better, I can fight. I can make a difference. I can improve things and set them right. As long as such a possibility exist, it doesn't feel right to give up. And leaving this world is the same as giving up on it."

"You do know that with every day that passes, a day a month ago becomes inaccessible forever. Time is against you. If you keep this illusion up, in no time you will find that you can't actually do a difference anymore. Mami will be out of reach and Madoka will already be broken..."

"Don't talk of her like that." Even thought she said, that, her voice stayed as empty as before.

"Isn't that how she is right now?" He tilted his head on the side to punctuate his question. Homura didn't answer, knowing this was the sad truth. Seeing that this was a dead end, Kyubey tried a different approach. "Maybe you could pass it on to Akemi..."

She looked at him with a question mark in her eyes. "You mean allowing her to go back in time instead of me?"

"If you have lost your determination to continue, then she could take your place at it." Homura was thoughtful at this. "And it would give her a clear and definite objective, which would probably keep her from doing anything reckless like ending her own life."

"But then I would be powerless. I mean, even more than I am right now. Without this shield, how can I fight at all?"

"I didn't mean of making her leave right here and now; but when this world will come to an end that possibility will arise. Tell me, in what state did you leave the other ones?"

"At best, Mitakihara destroyed. At worst... Gretchen..."

"Those two possibilities are therefore the most probable outcome of this world, if you happen to fail. At that point, who will you allow to go back in time: you or Akemi?"

"I can't trust anyone else for this. Not even Akemi."

Kyubey was skeptical at this statement. "I thought you wanted what was best for Madoka. You said yourself that you didn't know if you could make it again. You are starting to give up, and by doing so you won't be as efficient and won't be thinking as well as you should because your motivation will be crumbling. This is the best way to make a mistake and to actually make things _worse_." He took a short pause and then attacked the other side of the argument. "On the other hand, if it is Akemi that goes back, she will devote herself to Madoka like you used to do in your first timelines. She will be new, fresh, unsoiled. And there also will be another Homura at that time, the one _you_ were a month ago, without any memories of all the hardships you have gone through in the last few weeks. Both Akemi and you will be in perfect conditions to keep on fighting destiny."

Homura shrugged. "You put it like I didn't really have a choice."

"Which is better? You, or Akemi?"

"Akemi, I guess. But..." She stopped mid sentence, realising once again that she was staying because she didn't want to leave Madoka. Not this Madoka, as at the time this choice will be relevant, she wouldn't be alive anymore, but _all_ Madokas. Her journey to save her best friend. She couldn't bring herself to believe that this Homura, the one she had been a few weeks ago and the one that will take over in said scenario, was _her_. It just felt as a distant entity that she didn't know anything off, and that just happened to have the same name and look as her. She was someone _else_. And to allow this... stranger... to take care of Madoka, Homura would need to die —well, more precisely staying in a dead world without any power, hunted by witches and threatened to become one herself at any time. And dying was not really high on her list of priorities right now. "... but... it's just plain wrong."

"Maybe along your human values, but it would be efficient and it's probably the best course of action both in the long run and right now."

It took her some time to realise what he implied in his last sentence. She looked back at him, confused. "What do you mean, 'right now'?"

"I mean, what is the difference between now and when something comes up with Madoka? If Akemi goes back, say tomorrow, and you were without your shield, you and Madoka would be at the same point as you would in the event something comes up prior to the time travel. The result would be exactly the same, only the day where Akemi will arrive will change. It can even be better; if Madoka hadn't yet transformed, you could kill her and save this planet, then kill yourself and save the city."

"You are sick..." Tired of hearing Kyubey, she made her bed reappear in a corner and tried to sleep again. At least, it would force him to keep his wild suggestions to himself.

.

(||—||)

.

He watched her sleep. Her sleep was agitated, as it was since a while ago.

If Kyubey had any emotion, he would be smiling right now. A smile of conspiracy, a smile of madness, a smile of absolute power. But he showed none of that. Instead, he just felt like fate was his to shape. With this talk with Homura, every outcome had been covered. Knowledge meant action. She had the knowledge; she might take action. That was all he asked for.

From now on, nothing could go wrong; or more precisely everything that could happen simply benefits himself.

It was time.

His ultimatum gave him only until tomorrow, at the sunset. It was enough.

Through one of his white body in the streets he started to walk in a certain direction. North. He knew exactly where the two girls lived; Umika and Kaoru were their name. He knew Jyubey was staring at him from the shadows, and that Hachibey probably had his eyes on him too. He didn't care. Let them watch and see...

He arrived at the hotel where the two girls were. In front of the entrance, what was not his surprise to see his black counterpart.

"Hello, Jyubey."

"Why are you here?" Although his voice didn't show any trace of it, Kyubey knew he wasn't expected here tonight.

"I'm here to tell you how to beat my Puella magis."

This took Jyubey by surprise. "You surrender? What made you take this decision?"

"Hachibey spoke to me." He left out the fact that his decision wasn't motivated in the slightness by the threat, but it wasn't a lie nonetheless.

"Glad you came to your senses, Kyubey. So, what information did you want to give me?"

"Before that, I want something from you in exchange."

"A deal?"

"With the knowledge I provide you, before noon tomorrow, kill them."

Jyubey did not agree immediately to this. "I can't promise that. I am not in charge of the battle plan. Umika is. But I can let you talk to her."

"That will do."

The two of them disappeared in the hotel as soon as the door gave way to a passing human. It was so easy to manipulate everyone!

Soon, all problems concerning a certain time traveler will be fix. Permanently.

.

(||/|\||)

.


	14. Chapter 14: Through the Hourglass

Chapter 14: Through the Hourglass

* * *

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(||\|/||)

.

Akemi woke up with the painful feeling of having every muscle of her body covered in bruises. Unconsciousness had been a blessing during her recovery, but now every single part of her body was in pain. Stiff, she tried to move a little: first a finger and then an arm. When she was comfortable with the pain of a single arm, she tried her other limbs.

"Nee-san! You're awake, desu!"

Akemi wasn't yet ready to turn her head and when she tried, the pain in her shoulder stopped her. For now, she needed to take things slowly, one at a time.

"Hi, Mitchiko. Hum... can you help me sit? I can't put any force into most of my body."

"Sure!"

It took them a few minutes to find a comfortable sitting position, but with the help of Mitchiko, it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be. She could now inspect the extent of the damage. She didn't have any visible wound, and by the way she felt no internal wound either, only an exceptionally sore shoulder that spread all the way to her neck and down her arm, and the same with her stomach.

"How long was I asleep?"

"More than a day. Are you okay, desu-ka?"

"I can't say I'm in the best of shape for now, but yeah. I'm fine."

Next to her came a walking Kyubey. "I see you have waked up. Homura and Madoka are worried outside. They asked me to warn them as soon as you felt better."

"So they are both still alive. I'm glad."

"Can you walk?"

"Hey, let me take this slowly please. I'll be able to,... eventually."

"When you'll be ready, they'll be waiting at Homura's place. Try not to take the whole day."

A little later, she was stable on her feet and could walk just fine, but the transition between upright and sitting position was still hard to pull off.

She then shifted the world around her and Mitchiko, and Homura's house appeared before them. Mitchiko ran inside, impatient to see Madoka and Homura.

.

(||—||)

.

"You've redecorate?"

"Don't mind it..."

The place was still empty for the most part. Only two couches were left in Homura's apartment, when before there was about a dozen. Akemi didn't ask any more questions, seeing Homura didn't felt like talking about it.

Mitchiko threw herself in Madoka's arms for a hug. "Hi!"

"Hello, Mitchiko. How are you doing?"

"Way better since nee-chan woke up, desu!"

Akemi saw that Madoka was forcing a smile on her face for Mitchiko's benefice. She looked tired, down, without energy. Well, that wasn't really surprising. They all were. "Mitchiko, why don't you give a hug to Homura-chan too?" she said, her face stretching into a malicious smile.

Homura made a step away from the kid. "No, I'll..."

"WEEEEE!" There was no escaping her. She ran across the room and literally jumped on the cold girl. At the impact, the both fell to the ground, a fact Mitchiko took advantage of by tickling her to make her laugh. This at least made Madoka smile of a true smile.

"Having fun Homura-chan?"

"You did this on purpose!"

"Yep!"

"Wait 'til I start a pillow fight. You're dead."

"Huh, no, I'm not in any shape to do a..."

"PILLOW FIGHT! Wait, where are the pillows, desu-ka?"

Just beside Homura and little Mitchiko, many pillows appeared in a purple light at once. Mitchiko's face lightened up, contrasting with the sadistic grin on Homura's.

Akemi wasn't pleased with the idea. She couldn't even run to escape the massacre.

.

(||—||)

.

"So... *ouch*... everyone's fine? Beside me... *ouch*" After maybe half an hour of playing around, they all had recovered some enthusiasm. It seemed like an eternity since they last played at all, especially for Homura. It did much good, although Akemi's shoulder had suffered a few hit during the pillow fight. She was now putting ice on it to cool the pain.

"We're okay. You were the most badly injured." Said Madoka.

"Madoka-san, don't forget they almost got you too." Reminded Homura.

"But you protected me, and I'm fine now."

"Can you two tell me what I missed?"

Madoka threw a worried glance at Mitchiko. It was clear she didn't want to say anything in front of her. "Can you... ?"

Akemi understood and turned to the little girl that was trying to build a pillow castle. "Mitchiko-chan."

"Yes?"

"We need to discuss important matter that may take a while. It'll be boring stuff. So I was thinking that you could go back home and latter in the afternoon I'll go get you and we'll do a walk downtown, and maybe go say hi to Emi-sempai. What do you think?"

"Okay! Are you coming back too?"

"No, not now. I'll try to not be too long."

"Hu... okay. Bye onee-chan! Bye meany-nee-chan!"

Homura mumbled to herself: 'Why am I still a meany?'

In the next instant, Akemi took Mitchiko by the hand and both vanished. A few seconds later, only Akemi reappeared. She then got the whole story of the fight up to the creapy aspect of Kazumi's witch, and then Akemi informed them about the nun that had managed to escape from Eden by herself. They tried talking about strategies, but none of them were in the mood to take any initiative. Since the beginning they have always acted reactively. They just wanted things to cool down a bit, and engaging the other Puella magis directly wasn't the best way to avoid a confrontation. Maybe they had given up and had left the town after the death of one of them? The group could only wish it was so.

It was also agreed to give Kazumi's grief seed to Akemi. Homura had used a bit more magic in the last day than Madoka, but nether of their soul gem was as bad as Akemi's, who used a lot of magic to heal her wounds. She also agreed to try to lower her magic consumption for the time being, at Homura's request.

When every subject had been covered, Homura and Madoka escorted Akemi back outside. A courtesy, since Akemi could planewalk from anywhere to her barrier. Homura would have liked to talk to her about Kyubey's suggestion of last night, but she didn't want to tackle that subject in front of Madoka, so she kept quiet.

They saw her off at the door. When she was ready to leave, she started to shift between worlds, but at the last second she caught something at the corner of her eye. When she arrived in Eden, she wondered about what she just truly saw. It was Madoka. Madoka's face which looked pass Akemi. And her face showed stupor!

.

(||—||)

.

Before Akemi had vanished, Madoka had seen, hidden behind a corner of a nearby house, a familiar white outfit. She didn't have any time to react. As soon as Akemi had left, the nun stepped out of the shadows, her book opened in her hand.

"Madoka, watch out!"

A tongue of flame came their way at high speed. Madoka didn't move an inch at the incoming attack, completely stunned. It seemed for her that time was running slower. She could see clearly the fire burn its way meter after meter toward her; she could feel the heat all over her face and hand, but she couldn't move. She was struck there, as if hypnotised by her imminent death.

Just when the fire was about to reach her, she just now noticed that Homura was in front of her, holding her shield between them and the brazier. The flames engulfed them both, barely kept away by the magical protection of the shield. Somehow, it reminded her of that time when she was in Akemi's protective bubble and Homura had thrown a rocket at a witch. Just like then, the flames were all around her, yet she was safe. The situation had some kind of unreal beauty, the colors dancing all around in shades of red and yellow.

Homura was telling her something, but she didn't listened. Mostly, she didn't want to hear. The nun was back, and the fight continued. But it was without sense, it was all meaningless. Fighting was meaningless. It could only bring grief and sadness, yet they were fighting in the name of happiness and safety. Because they were fighting, the happiness they all yearned for was only drowned in wounds and losses.

It was all meaningless.

"Madoka!" Homura was trying to bring Madoka to her senses, to focus on the battle instead of just standing there, looking into empty space. A vain attempt.

Through the flames, on the side, she could spot some purple with what looked like glass orbs. Akemi was back. _But is she really in any shape to fight?_ Homura worried.

The torrent of flames stopped as abruptly as it started, but then Homura understood why. Before herm there was the blade of a double sword swinging down mere inches from her face. The fire had just been a screen to allow for a close finish-up, keeping them distracted long enough to pull the ambush off, but she could still dodge. She stepped away from the blade, trying not to bump into Madoka in doing so. Umika's sword slashed at Homura's arm, slicing through the fabric and merely scratching her skin.

She only realised too late that it wasn't her head that was the target, but her shield. The straps of the magical weapon were cut loose and the round hourglass was pushed out of the way with the flat of Umika's sword.

It went flying over Kaoru, who immediately jumped in the air and attempted a bicycle kick at it.

.

(||—||)

.

_"The shield?" Umika was tired, but she tried to ignore the feeling in favor of some important and urgent matters. She could sleep when it'll be all over, but for now, the little white alien that was in front of her required all of her attention._

_"Yes." Replied Kyubey. Jyubey was on his side, supporting by his presence what the white one had to say. "Her shield is the source of her powers. If you manage to separate her from it, she'll be as powerless as Madoka."_

_"Why should I listen to anything you say? We came here to stop your doing in the first place. You are the enemy as long as I recall."_

_"You could put it as surrendering, but I can't manage those girls by myself. Killing them is not in my power, and I believe Jyubey told you about turning them into witches?" He gave her the innocent look that had caught so many girls before in his tendrils. _

_"Yeah, he did..."_

_"I'm giving you the opportunity to finish this in one last encounter. Tomorrow, ambush them and aim to remove Homura's shield. Destroy it if you can, or simply put it out of reach until the matter is settled."_

_"And what about the other two girls? Madoka and... Akemi you said." She wasn't quite used to refer to Akemi by her name, having thought up to here that it was the name of Homura. Well, in a way it was her name, but it made thing much simpler this way._

_"What about them?" Kyubey asked. "The last battle showed us that Madoka's magic can't kill, and for all I know, Akemi is still unconscious. And even if she was in full shape; you fought her. You know the measure of her abilities. She is weak."_

_"She might still be able to pull something off." Calmly replied Umika._

_"If you think so, then she'll be the only threat on their team. And if you really want to take her seriously, which I don't think is necessary, you can study her knowledge and come up with proper counter magic like you did to escape from her realm."_

_"You know...?"_

_"I know much about you. So will you agree to help me now?" _

_Again, 'no' wasn't a possible answer to this proposition._

.

(||—||)

.

"AKEMI! THE SHIELD!"

Before Kaoru could kick the artifact into the distance, it got surrounded in a glass orb and flew out of reach into Akemi's hands. However, this distracted Homura from the girl that was next to her and next thing she knew, she was struck in the ribs with the flat of the long double sword and was thrown with incredible force into the wall. "Keep quiet."

The shock made her lose her breath. She gasped for air, but it was a vain attempt. She could only choke as her lungs refuse to let any air in. It took her everything she had to not suffocate. That attack was aimed precisely to incapacitate her long enough for them to do their business.

She looked down, catching her breath as fast as she could, and her eyes caught sight of her left arm. It wasn't really hurt, even if the blood suggested otherwise. But the shield wasn't there anymore. She didn't have access to her last gun nor cars. She didn't have _any_ weapon! It was then that she realized that none of them three had any fighting power now. Akemi was unable to make fast movements and was soon taken care of by Kaoru's brutal force. Homura, having finally taken a deep breath, could only watch as Akemi received a punch directly in the face and fell to the ground, screaming. She needed help! She couldn't take them on alone!

But as soon as Homura tried to stand up, she felt an unbearable pain where Umika had stricken. Once again, she lost her breath and fell to a knee. She had a couple of broken ribs, and it hurt like hell each and every time she took a breath, her lung rubbing against them.

She watched as Akemi tried to teleport, the air around her rippled by the effect of her magic, but then it abruptly came to a stop when Umika spoke some kind of incantation. This failed attempt got her another punch from Kaoru.

Akemi was down; now no one was left to protect... _Madoka!_ Homura remembered, panic taking hold off her mind. _Not her, not my Madoka! _On the other side, another Umika was walking casually toward Madoka, who hadn't moved since the beginning of the battle, petrified like a statue. She wouldn't run, she couldn't fight. She just looked with empty eyes at the nun with glasses that was coming her way like a white reaper.

It's was all over. None of them could do anything, and they would soon be killed. With each step Umika took toward Madoka, Homura grew more worried and desperate. _Move! Damned it, Madoka move! Make a run for it! Don't just stand there, MOVE!_

She made the mechanical gesture of reaching for her shield and turning back time again, but it wasn't there. She wasn't even allowed this escape anymore!

Umika was still getting closer and closer to Madoka. Homura tried to scream, but the pain of her ribs was excruciating and only a faint moan escaped her lips. As with everything she had done since the Walpurgis night, it was all in vain. Everything had been vain, and she had failed to save Madoka yet again. But this time, it was final. She didn't get another chance.

She had failed.

_Are you leaving?_

Now she couldn't leave, she was stuck here to watch as her friends and herself fell.

_If I go back, history will get worse and worse every time._

She couldn't help in the least. All she ever did was brought upon Madoka this hellish misery. She was worthless.

_You feel something for her, don't you?_

She never deserved Madoka in the first place. She didn't deserve her friendship and she didn't deserve to be loved by her. She never succeeded in repaying Madoka for that first time she saved her, that first time she smile to her, that first time she spoke to her. Madoka succeeded to protect her; she only failed and failed and failed again.

Again.

And again...

It all seemed like a huge tragedy she kept replaying over and over again, one where the end was always predetermined, where her doom was assured. Maybe it was a tragedy,... maybe she was playing a play someone else wrote, along with Madoka and everyone else...

Looking back on her own story, her own character, it felt kind of... romantic. She was only a character that the play doomed to fail, all in the name of friendship and unspoken love. She gave her all, fought destiny and sadness, broke the limit of time to save a certain pink girl from certain death and growing despair, only to fail each and every time in scenarios worst than the previous ones. _Yeah... romantic..._

This idea somewhat soothed her pain and grief in this fateful hour. It didn't sound so bad once put this way. Living was all a huge play, one with roles and acts and plot. Some roles where doomed to fail and live misery, but it was all to make the play beautiful, tragic and perfect.

She grinned, and started laughing. Her voice didn't sound anything like the one she remembers, but it was okay since it was part of the play. Everything needed to be organised neatly in order for the great tragedy to take place! So much to do, so little time to do it!

Wait... time. A tragedy around time! That was a perfect fit! She was once the main protagonist, the one who was doomed to fail in a tragic and heroic way, but she grew bored of that. Now, her role will be that of the main villain. Yeah! That sounded just perfect! The main villain that will appear across time and whom the main protagonist will have to fight, and fail some way or another! It needed to be tragic, wonderful and emotional! The perfect tragedy, hers to build.

Quick, quick! Let's start! There is much to do, and time is waiting for me to make an appearance on stage!

Ladies and gentlemen! Let the show begin!

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(||/|\||)

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	15. Chapter 15: Choose Your Loss

Chapter 15: Choose Your Loss

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Kyubey was watching the magnificent witch that once had been Homura rise to the sky, ready to wreck havoc on this town. The beauty of this scene didn't move him in the least; all he saw in it was another step forward in his plan.

Sharing the best view point next to him was Jyubey. His two Puella magis were trying to fend off Walpurgis as best they could, but their best wasn't enough. He seemed kind off annoyed by this twist of event. "This wasn't supposed to happen..."

"Actually, you should have seen it coming. Your girls were dominating mines; there was no way mines could win. The only possibilities they had was to either let themselves die, or turn to witches."

"You planed this all along, didn't you?"

"I was prepared for this, yes." Watching the fight unfold, Kyubey could see a wave of familiars spreading from Homura's home and devouring the souls of the unlucky ones still alive at that point. He could see them from his vantage point, but the four girls caught in the heat of action couldn't. That would make for a nasty surprise later... "For what I had in mind, that shield was a critical piece I couldn't afford to lose. That's why I needed to take it away from her, in the case she turned into a witch out of the three. But that's really the only preparation I did." _And maybe the location of the ambush_, he added mentally.

"I don't care about that shield. My concern for now is Madoka. I fear that she transforms into an entropic dark hole." Well, that was one way of putting it.

Kyubey smirked. "Do you want me to prevent that from ever happening?" he said, his malicious intent hidden under his innocent voice.

"Are you able to?"

"Sure. All I need of you is to call back Umika and Kaoru and let my girls deal with the witch."

Jyubey blinked a few times in disbelief. "You're telling me that those two that can't even fight properly would be able to take on the strongest witch in history?"

"They already did once; they will certainly be able to do it a second time." Right after that, he sealed the argument by adding: "If your girls are not called back soon, it is a certainty they will die."

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(||—||)

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Right over the place that had once been Homura's house, there floated the humongous witch of theater and tragedy, the Walpurgisnacht. Underneath, a circus of green elephants and colorful familiars invaded the streets, the troupe and characters of her play walking in some kind of carnival of doom. The buildings of the area started to rise to the sky to make way for the stage of the unfolding drama.

Umika and Kaoru stood petrified by the intimidating size and incredible power of this witch. This was what Umika had feared the most. She had feared she would be unlucky enough to see the Walpurgis night.

"This... is impossible..." whispered Kaoru for herself.

Umika looked back at the two other girls —Akemi trying to stand on a knee and Madoka helping her achieve merely that— and decided they were not a priority. That first time with Kazumi, they had just been lucky, but really they were useless and weak. She didn't even think about asking for their help to take on the mad laughing monster above her head. She could only rely on Kaoru and herself for this one.

"Kaoru. How many grief seeds do you have left?"

Looking away from the sky, the blond girl redirected her attention on Umika. "About a dozen."

"Ready to do this?" she asked, a serious look on her face.

"Hell I am!" At this they both jumped toward the flying witch, leaving behind Madoka and Akemi.

"Are you all right?" Asked Madoka, more concerned by the safety of her friend than by her own. She was also constantly throwing glances at Walpurgis, trying to figure out how she could get a clear shot to it at this proximity and with all the houses flying around them, blocking her line of view. For now, not a single opportunity had appeared.

Akemi was shaking on her legs. The punches and kicks she just received didn't mix well with her wounds of the other day. She didn't really have a choice but to use this technique again. "I'm fine." She said, standing firmly as the pain vanished for the second time in two days. She needed to be careful with this, as the numbed pain was merely an illusion. She must always keep in mind that she was hurt, and not get distracted by this illusion the same way Sayaka did.

"Are you sure? Your wounds..."

"I know my wounds, and I'll try to not get hurt any more than I already am..." She adjusted back her glasses on her nose, even though they had cracked under the last assault of Kaoru. "... but I want to help Homura-chan too you know."

Madoka transformed into her pink outfit and gave her a weak smile. "Yeah, let's save her." To punctuate her statement, she materialised her bow in her left hand.

_May I remind you that people are dying right now?_ Said Kyubey, telepathically. _Every second you keep talking, people's souls get taken away. You should start moving now._

_Don't you think we know that?_ Replied Akemi, jumping forward to go give a hand to the other two girls that kept the witch at bay. While running, she tightly strapped Homura's shield to her belt so it wouldn't get lost in the battle that was to come. _The only way we can finish this is with Madoka-chan, and she needs to get far enough to get a clear shot. _She said that knowing Madoka would hear it and that she would take position accordingly_. Those two and I will give her enough time to get ready._

_Actually, I asked them to back off and let you two deal with the witch on your own._

_YOU WHAT? What do you think you're doing you bastard!? I'll never be able to hold it off by myself long enough!_

_What are you babbling about? Have you already forgotten about your resources? All you have to do is bring Walpurgisnacht in your dimension, that place you call Eden, along with Madoka, and then manipulate the distance and the physics of your world to give her that opening. It shouldn't be all that hard..._

_But Mitchiko-chan is there! She'll get killed!_

_Hundreds of people are getting killed as we speak. It would stop as soon as the witch leaves this world. Are you going to sacrifice hundreds of innocent lives just to save that kid?_

"Fucking piece of trash!" She had been a fool all along to believe he ever was on her side. All that mattered for him was efficiency, no matter at what cost. Akemi continued to curse at the little alien all the while she attacked Walpurgis with all her might, alone. She didn't want to even think about sacrificing Mitchiko, she didn't want to believe this was the only way.

But as she knew Kyubey, she never was given the choice in the first place.

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(||—||)

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Madoka was running and jumping around the debris of the town, trying to get some distance from the fight; but on her way she was attacked by some girl's shadows, the witch's familiars. They weren't really interested in a fight and after exchanging a few blows they decided to give up on this tough meal for some easier prey. The familiars then turned around and invested every house in which there was life and started to drain the vitality of those that inhabited them. To Madoka's horror, some clowns even snatched the souls away from their screaming human body and flew out in the open to 'play' with the souls, playing being something along the lines of trying to get the bigger part in a tearing contest at three or four. The soul had kept its human form, meaning the terror and pain was all too visible on their faces as they were dismembered.

And then, she was stopped in her track. Not by a familiar or a crashing building, although those sure slowed her down, but by a pesky white cat-like creature she knew all too well by now. Kyubey was in the middle of all this desolation, staring expectantly at her. His casual posture violently contrasted with the wreckages around him.

"You shouldn't shoot under the current circumstances, Madoka." He said, waving his tail in a leisurely manner behind him.

"I don't have time to be speaking with you." She answered back, trying to ignore him as she walked pass him.

"You acknowledge the fact that by the time you walk far away, many others will die?" He didn't look around when she passed him, nor did he tried anything else to stop her.

"It can't be helped right now." She said back, getting away with a newfound resolve. If she hurried enough, she could save lives. That's how she needed to think of it, not the other way around.

Now completely alone, Kyubey spoke aloud, continuing the discussion for no one but himself to hear. "Madoka, you don't really understand the consequences of the choice you just made do you?"

Poor foolish girl...

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(||—||)

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"Why did you call us back?" Kaoru and Umika had run back a safe distance from the witch and Jyubey was there, waiting for them. He was watching with his acute vision the purple Puella magi desperately fight the floating monstrosity and fail to deal any significant damage to it. The two girls could only guess at what was going on, hence the question.

"You are not required for this fight."

"What are you talking about?" Asked Kaoru. Umika was looking in the same direction than Jyubey, trying to see what was catching so much of his attention.

"Akemi and Madoka are the only ones who can deal with the Walpurgisnacht."

"What? Those weaklings? Are you kidding me?"

"That's what Kyubey told me, and I believe him."

"Seriously? You believed something the Big Bad said? Now were screwed!"

"He also promised me to prevent Madoka from awakening..." The black and white alien added. This caught the attention of the two girls. Madoka turning to witch was serious matter. "That is all I can hope for now. Preventing the creation of that witch and the destruction of our most precious resource is my first priority. I couldn't refuse."

"A single city isn't worth all off humanity, is that what you're saying?"

"Do you have a different opinion?"

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(||—||)

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Akemi was holding off the shadow in the gray sky as best as she could, pushing it away from what she believed was where Madoka had headed earlier. She summoned orbs of humongous sizes to match her opponent's, but her forces were rapidly drying away. And it wasn't like her attacks did any damage either.

_Madoka-chan? Are you ready yet?_ The mighty witch had started to get annoyed with Akemi and spitted fire her way. She dodged one tongue of flame and made a glass shield to protect herself from a second one.

_Almost there!..._ Madoka answered back.

Akemi continued to keep the witch's attention, trying to prevent it from wandering about the city and destroying the rest of it. But she was alone,... against the strongest witch in history (bearing Gretchen). Trying was not enough, and the Walpurgis night slowly made her way forward and spread the corruption. More and more buildings joined the slow waltz in the sky, turning around the diva in the same fashion the planets turn around a star. The sky filled itself with debris and dust, clouding even more the already absent sun.

Unfortunately for Akemi, it was that time Walpurgis choose to wave away at this annoying insect. A first building that was once a pinnacle or architecture came crashing on her. She had just enough time to raise a protective bubble and avoid being outright crushed by the weight. Her bubble tore through the steel structure, resisting the choc off walls after walls until it passed all the way to the other side, leaving her quite shaken. Right after then, the witch's attacks became more and more abundant and aggressive. Flames and minions joined the dance between the girl and the lady. It was quickly becoming too much for Akemi to withstand.

_Madoka-chan, anytime now!_

_Incoming. Be sure to catch Homura-chan afterwards._

The next instant, Akemi was completely engulfed by a soothing pink light. It was all around her and she could feel the energy radiating through it, like a warm feeling of security, peace and comfort, but it didn't hurt her in the least, nor did it blind her. And soon enough, it disappeared, and at the place Walpurgis had been earlier was Homura, naked and unconscious. Before she could fall any distance, Akemi caught her in one of her glass bubbles and slowly got down to the ground. The city was rewinding gradually to its state before the bending of the rules of physics. Floating buildings made their way back to their respective positions, broken glass and debris repaired themselves, dust settled and the sky cleared itself on a bright blue sky on this Sunday afternoon.

_This had gone better than expected_, Akemi thought.

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(||—||)

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Homura came to in her own home, in her bed and under her blanket. When she opened her eyes, first thing she saw was two pink pig-tail and an adorable smile.

"Madoka..."

"Oh good! You remember her!"

Homura turned her head toward the one who spoke and it took her some time to figure out that she was Akemi, the same as her and yet mostly different. Her memory was still very fuzzy — somehow, she felt like playing theater. Didn't know why though — but Madoka and Akemi patiently told her about the recent events until everything was set back at its proper place.

"So... Akemi-san," she asked, her voice naturally taking a low monotone tone, "... you fought against me — Walpurgis— on your own?"

She beamed, proud of her exploit, but humbly exclaimed: "I only kept it distracted. It's not like I actually beat it on my own or anything!" Though she said that, her face was split in a huge smile, happy to have done so much. It had all gone so well, and unlike what Kyubey had suggested, Mitchiko was still alive. She had save Mitchiko! For once, she felt like she really achieved something. "Madoka-chan did most of the job!"

"I only did what I could..." She didn't want to get praised, but was still really happy by this happy reunion. She was glad everyone was safe. Already, they started to talk how things will calm down from there, how Homura was human again, free of her contract and of all that suffering. They spoke about their dream from there, their hope for the future and all the difficulties they were sure to overcome. They laugh, smiled, talked.

After such a success, they felt invincible.

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(||—||)

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Later that day, Madoka left Homura's home, soon followed by Akemi. Each of them needed to rest, and the next morning, school was yet again mandatory for two of them.

When Akemi got back to Eden, she was scold by an angry Mitchiko. With the Walpurgis thing going on, she had completely forgotten about her promise to go out. Only later, after some shopping and walking around downtown, did she realise that Homura's shield was still in her possession. She thought it wasn't really an important matter now that she was human again and decided that she'll give her back first thing the next day.

On her end, Madoka was happily walking back home. She was tired, but happy, something she hadn't been in a long time. She wanted to see her parents and her younger brother and give them all a hug. She wanted to give a bit of her happiness to everyone she passed with a smile, a greeting. She felt like she could bring light on the whole world, make everyone happy and erase every misfortune on her route. Everything could finally settle down and go back to normal.

She continued walking, not noticing that there was not a single car on the road, not a single passerby on the sidewalk. She was completely oblivious to the tragedy that had stricken this part of the city, all hidden under the repaired scenery.

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(||—||)

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Some time after the two girls had left, Kyubey found his ways to an opened window of Homura's home. As soon as he entered the house, he received a direct warning from Homura, who was sitting on her bed, meditating on the latest events.

"I thought I told you to never come here again." She said, anger showing in her voice.

"I just thought you would like to make a new contract, so I came." He replied innocently.

"Well, I don't. Not this early after gaining back my humanity."

"Oh, well then. Too bad for you."

Homura squinted at Kyubey, trying to figure out his motive and the meaning behind those words. "Why would it be 'bad' for me to keep my wish for later?" she said, threatening.

Kyubey took his time to answer back to Homura, knowing he was in complete control of the situation.

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(||—||)

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Madoka was coming in view of her house. She would arrive just in time for the supper; a perfect timing for she was getting hungry. The car was there. Maybe they would go out and buy sushi or just go to the restaurant. She was in the mood for something special. Thinking about what she most wanted to eat, she turned the key in the lock and hastily removed her shoes.

"I'm home!"

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(||—||)

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"You didn't realise either? From Madoka and Akemi, that wouldn't have surprised me, but you?..."

"Quit the useless talk and tell me what I missed!"

"Don't you think her house is awfully close to yours?" He asked in his usual cheerful voice. "I mean; she can easily walk from here to there, isn't that right?"

"Your point?" She was restraining herself from just kicking him out and having some peace, but curiosity was stronger than hate. For now.

"Well, Walpurgis appeared here. And her house is close to yours. Don't you think there was some risk there?"

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(||—||)

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"Hello?" Nobody answered her. The house was all silent, probably empty. She looked by the window to check once again for the car. It was there. Maybe they just went for a walk and would be back soon. But Madoka missed them. She wanted to give them all hugs as she arrived, to tickle her young brother and sit on the lap of her father.

She went to check her brother's room to see if he was playing at something and didn't hear her, but the room was empty. She then looked in her dad's office, but no one was there.

She had resigned herself to wait for them to return when she stepped into the kitchen. There, on the cold ground, unmoving, laid the rest of her family.

A scream echoed in the evening, yet there was no one to hear it.

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(||—||)

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Homura brutally grabbed Kyubey with both hand, realisation slowly making its way to her mind. "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HER FAMILY?!"

Violently shaken in every direction, he calmly replied: "I didn't do anything. You did. You killed her family." He manages to successfully escape from her grip and walked away on the floor, keeping a respectable distance between them before continuing. "You turned into a witch, and one of the strongest one at that. And witches eat human souls. You were no exception."

"I... killed..." She never finished her sentence. The stare she gave to Kyubey was more than enough to convey all the horror she felt at the moment.

"Akemi is also to blame. During the fight, I suggested her to bring Walpurgis to her own dimension, which would have stopped it from harvesting anymore souls. At that point, Madoka's parents and brother were still alive, your familiars not yet having reached them. But their lives were on the edge. They could have died at any instant." For a short moment, he recalled to himself the exchange he had with Akemi in the middle of the destruction. There were no right choices back then. Both led to a path of pain and suffering,... "And yet," he continued, "Akemi refused to do that. Even knowing she was sacrificing the lives of many more people, she made the choice to not put Mitchiko at risk. She chooses to sacrifice many that she didn't know off to save a friend, instead of sacrificing a friend to save the many. She killed them just as much as you did." He said all that with his happy tone, waving his tail as if all of this was the least important thing in the world.

The pretty illusion that Homura, Akemi and Madoka had surrounded themselves in crumbled. The happiness of this afternoon had all just been a lie, a foolish lie. Things only got worse and worse each and every time, knowing no rest. "Where is Madoka right now?! Where is she?!" She was starting to panic. What will she say when she'll discover the terrible truth? How will she react? Why did things turned out like this?

"She just discovered the bodies. She should turn into a witch anytime now..."

"She mustn't! She must not turn into Kriemhild Gretchen!"

"You can't do anything about right now. Her soul gem is already ready to explode. I have never seen so much power in any single being... I wonder what she'll look like..."

"I WISH SHE COULDN'T! I WISH SHE CAN'T BECOME A WITCH!" She was crying now, unable to think straight, unable to forgive herself. _Why? Why do I keep hurting Madoka so much? Why?_...

He tilted his head forward, hiding the smile that had appeared on his trait. "If that is your wish, then I'll grant it."

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(||/|\||)

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* * *

I started to fall behind in my schedule. I wrote and rewrote this chapter too many times, never pleased with my drafts. The idea was there, but it never turned out well when I started typing. Even now, I get the feeling I could have done better with more time, but then I would have delayed this post even more. Hope it meets your expectations.

And God I was distracted this week! I kept getting sidetracked by epic Black Rock Shooter's anime, hilarious My little pony (Flutterguy is the absolute funniest thing in this world!), exotic Pokémon Black & White and freaky new Fringe episodes. Is this a usual symptom of writer's block? I wonder...

And once again, I had planned for this chapter to cover a bit more than this. I wanted to make another appearance of Hatchibey and to continue on Madoka's breakdown, but I guess it'll be in the next chapter. I hope to have fewer distractions this week and to finish another chapter soon, but I doubt it'll be quite as regular as before.

Have a good week, and keep on reading!


	16. Chapter 16: Meaningless

Chapter 16: Meaningless

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Homura ran to Madoka's house as fast as she could. The wind blew to her ears as she pushed herself pass normal human endurance with her newfound powers. There was no one in sight. Cars she passed were empty at a first glance, but looking back she could see bodies in them, unmoving. She never looked back after that. She was responsible for such desolation...

She made it to her door in only a few minutes. Panting, she didn't think twice before turning the handle and barging in.

"Madoka? Madoka, where are you?" She really hoped she was okay, that she was fine and sound, but she bore no illusions. Her family had died. The choc must have been unbearable...

She ran in the corridors, looking desperately in every room until she found her in the kitchen. Madoka was there, rolled in a ball in a dark corner and holding her dead brother so tightly her knuckles where turning white. She was crying silently, her face hidden in her younger brother's shirt.

"Madoka..." Homura walked to her, her heart sinking with every step she took. She then let herself fall to the ground and took Madoka in her arms, hugging her even though a dead body was in the way, even though Madoka didn't hug her back. She couldn't help but start crying too, from guilt and empathy. "Madoka,... I'm sorry..." She choked on her words. The sound of it wasn't at all representative of how guilty and bad she really felt. There was no word strong enough to express such feelings, but she tried nonetheless, her talk regularly interrupted by sobs. "I'm sorry... This is all my fault... I'm worthless, useless, unable to do anything right... I'm sorry... I shouldn't have turned into Walpurgis, I should have kept it in, even if it made me mad, even if it hurt me... please, Madoka, forgive me... please, I'm sorry... will you ever be able to forgive me?..." There was no reaction from Madoka.

She tried gently to separate Madoka from her brother, to make her let go of him and grab her instead. All she ever wanted was to help her, to make her happy, to build a future in which she lived. She didn't ask for much, so why was she denied it? Why couldn't she help in the least?

When Madoka realised Homura was trying to separate her from the body of her brother, she started struggling against her, keeping her hold on the remains of her family. "No!"

"Madoka, please... I just want to help."

Madoka threw a creepy look her way, one of accusation and hatred. "I think you've done enough, Homura-_san_."

Homura took the full blow of her accusations. There was so much venom in those words that she felt like what remained of her heart crumbled to dust. So much anger and animosity didn't belong to Madoka. She just couldn't bear to see that face; that so awful face warped out of recognition of the one she loved.

"But... Madoka..." She froze when Madoka jerked off of her hand. "I didn't mean to..."

"Why do you keep trying to save me?" Madoka's voice was harsh, cold, severe. She raised her head just enough to stare at Homura. The body she was holding fell to the floor without her realising she had let go of it. Madoka looked at her hands, shaking under the stress. On one of them was her ring, the one that marked her as a Puella magi, a witch to be. Her ring was pitch black, darker than she ever recalled it to be. Not a single shade of pink was left, not a single sliver of happiness or hope either. "Why... can't you realise that maybe it would be better for everyone if... you just _let me die_?" she let out in a single breath.

Homura was trying to get close to her, to comfort her. "Because I love you. I can't bear to lose you Madoka..."

"Don't give me that!" She screamed, getting away from Homura. "If you truly loved me, you would think of what's best for me! If you loved me, you wouldn't have hurt me so much! If you love me, you would kill me right here and now!" She looked up to her, pitifully pleading something Homura will never grant. "Just... kill me."

"Don't give up!" she said, trying, and failing once again to hold Madoka. "Things can go better! We can make them better! You mustn't give up just yet!"

While she was talking, Madoka had stood up and started walking unsteadily toward the table, not listening to Homura anymore. _Don't give up!_ She didn't understand at all. There was nothing left to hope for, nothing to fight for. _Don't give up!_ The sentence resounded in her head like the drumming of her heart at her ears, hunting her through each beat, each word.

_Don't give up! _

_Don't give up! _

_Don't give up!_

Ta-dum

Ta-dum

Ta-dum

Supper had been served when death had stricken, in the middle of mixed vegetables and beef. Madoka gave one last look at that meal forever lost, at the moments she won't be able to share with her family anymore, at everything that was lost today along her soul. Her life, her happiness, her loved ones, her hope, everything was lost. Everything had crumbled.

"If you won't kill me, then I'll do it myself." She grabbed a knife on the table and attempted to stab her own heart with it. At least this would be a relief in this hell; at least this will make everything disappear; at least she won't be able to feel anything anymore...

"STOP IT!"

_Don't give up!_

As Homura shouted, Madoka froze in her movement, as if held back by some invisible force. She was surprised and confused, the knife refusing to budge an inch closer to her chest. "No..." She tried to stab herself another time and was still stopped in her movement before the blade came close to her. "No, no no!" She was starting to cry from frustration as she tried again and again to end her life. "Why can't I..." She threw the knife away, useless piece of scrap, and grabbed her head in her hand in a madly manner. Tears were flowing down; her last escape from this hell had just disappeared. "Why?..."

_Don't give up!_

As confused and shocked as Madoka, Homura however took the opportunity to finally hold her. She couldn't share the pain of her friend for she had her own pain to withstand, but she could ease hers. "Don't kill yourself; please... don't let yourself die..." she didn't felt it as Madoka tensed up, the order sinking in her mind like a parasite. "I'll find a way... somehow... I'll do everything I can to help you, everything that is in my power. You're the first one who ever smiled to me, the first one that ever reached out to me... You were my first friend Madoka, and my best." She held her even closer, feeling in this proximity everything she hid to herself about her own feelings. "Without you, I was nothing... I wanted to give you the same thing you gave me; a life, a smile and a friend. But... you kept dying, whatever I did! You were my ideal, Madoka, can you understand that? You were the only thing for which I lived for, the only thing that kept me alive. I love you... I loved you ever since that first day and I kept loving you more and more as I put more of my soul in saving you. I can't stop now; I can't let you die now. I'll find the way, the only way, even though I must endure an eternity of pain for it, because it will be worth it... for you... so... Forgive me."

_Forgive me._

"I..." Madoka's mouth slowly opened up to say something, but she didn't want to forgive.

_Forgive me._

However, the words came out of her mouth, forced out against her will the same way something forced her to stop hurting herself. "... I... forgive..." She was horrified that her body was moving on its own, that it wasn't answering to her will anymore but to that order, that absolute order of Homura.

_Forgive me._

Though, Homura didn't notice her internal struggle and immediately felt relieved at those few words. She was forgiven; everything wasn't lost just yet...

_Forgive me._

"I forgive you... for being alive in the first place..." Homura's face fell in horror as she slowly made sense of what she was forgiven.

Madoka started to laugh maniacally, having found a way around the binding order. "I forgive you for loving me! I forgive you for being my friend! I forgive you for your help! I forgive you for those sins, and I'll forgive you if you die on me!"

Homura backed up with every word Madoak let out with ever growing terror. She made it all sound like everything she ever did was a mistake, like something that could be forgiven. This wasn't Madoka! It wasn't that poor, foolish, innocent and friendly little girl that smiled to her. It wasn't the friend she had just yesterday. It was somebody else, mean, harsh, mad, desperate. And Homura was the one that made her like this!

Crying, yet smiling, Madoka added one last time: "I forgive you... for you very existence is your sin."

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(||—||)

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Homura came back later at her home, empty and broken. Madoka was in pain, in constant sorrow and absolute hell, and she had put her there. She was responsible for her distress. She was responsible for her mental breakdown.

She recalled the ring of Madoka, her gem of an impossible black. This was the result of her wish. She couldn't become a witch anymore, so the pain and grief will just keep building in forever and ever, never allowed to escape. How many grief seeds would it take to soothe her pain? Would it even do anything now?

When she entered, she briefly noticed that Kyubey was still waiting for her. "So, how do you like your wish?"

Without any notice, he received a bullet strait in the head.

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(||—||)

.

"You did it once again."

"But I prevented Madoka just as I promised you."

"While inversing the flow of energy of the Walpurgisnacht. Do you know how much has been lost because of that?" Jyubey was, well not angry but something close to it. He came here to stop Kyubey from doing his entropic thing, whatever it was, and yet he allowed him to do it again this evening. It was a failure; he should have known better than to obliged. And yet, what choice did he have?

"I know all too well," replied Kyubey "and I don't care in the least."

"I should have told Umika to take that pinkette's soul gem before anything else... How stupid of me." And now it was too late. The opportunity had passed. What was done was done; all he could do now was to plan something else and not fail at it.

"This kind of decision is what separates a real incubator from an amateur like you." Said a condescending Kyubey. Today's results were more than satisfying. Everything went smoothly. Jyubey was so easy to manipulate!

A third voice echoed through the streets, low and intimidating, joining the discussion between incubators. "So you have failed yet again to dispose of those nuisances, as I asked of you, Kyubey?" Hachibey came in the alley the other two were in, towering them from a feet or two. "And... Jyubey. What a disappointment. Do I need to put you on the list of unreliable incubators?" His cold eyes conveyed a feeling of might and of absolute power. He was judge, jury and soon executioner on this matter, and was taking a sadistic pleasure in abusing of his power on the little ones.

Jyubey bowed before his direct superior. "It won't happen again."

_This one will obey._ "You won't be given the chance to amend yourself. I'm taking this matter in my paws." _And this one will not,_ he thought, turning to the white alien. "Kyubey. You are a disgrace to hold the responsibility of an incubator! I will no longer tolerate your doing. Your actions speak louder than any words on this matter."

"So there is nothing to add."

Hachibey walked right in front of him and stared down, his cold blue eye suddenly shining brightly, outclassing the setting sun in the little alley. "You know the protocol. You know what happens to unreliable incubators." He said, eager to feel the taste of death in his throat. "As soon as this problem you've caused is fixed, you will be _terminated_ and the data you've collected so far will be analysed, sorted by relevance and implant in another puny specie on the waiting list." His eye was locked on Kyubey's, tearing through his mind to find the one part he was searching for. "But until then, your ability to form contracts will be permanently removed. In the event you are not terminated by the eight day from now on, your entity will _dislocate_, have I made myself clear?" Something clicked in Kyubey's mind, triggering the delayed self-destruction of the entity of many bodies. Kyubey had just been sentenced to death!

"All too clear."

"Anything to add?" The huge feline said, his eye reverting to normal.

"As I said, there is nothing to add."

Without adding a single word, Hachibey left, Jyubey following just behind. _Your fall will be mine to watch_, he thought. None of the incubators particularly liked any other. They merely worked together because it was the best course of action. But more often than not, one's way of doing was the other's very taboo. Conflicts between incubators were rarely as peaceful as what just happened. This was way too easy, thought Hachibey. Kyubey was definitely planning something...

.

(||—||)

.

On his side, even being the one sentenced to death, Kyubey didn't feel any anger or anything. No fear, no apprehension, no doubt, only certainty that his life was about to end.

Well, one of his life. He will still exist in all those parallel universes Akemi and Homura created. And he will exist in the last one, the most important one. He'll be the one to reap the benefice of his hard work; he'll be the one to create the _perfect_ witch; he'll be the one incubator who will save the whole universe. He still had a chance.

In three days, it will be the 30th of May.

Exactly a month after the Walpurgisnacht.

He needed to get going.

.

(||—||)

.

Jyubey was following Hachibey across the town. The blue and red incubator seemed to know exactly where he was going, walking without hesitation of any sort. Soon, they arrived at an abandoned shed. It was the place Hachibey and Kyubey had met the previous day. There was nothing there, for all Jyubey knew.

"Why did you come here?" He said, sitting in the entrance from which he had a good view of the room.

"I don't recall asking you to come with me, so don't annoy me." He walked to a corner of the room. There, hidden among the debris and planks were soul gems: the one he took from Kyubey and some others he found in the meantime. They were at many different shades of black and corruption.

"I was curious." Replied Jyubey, not missing a single step of Hachibey's doing.

He gave the little one an exasperate look, but didn't really complain. "Fine then." he hissed. He then turned around, ignoring his unwanted spectator, and stretched his long ears toward the first gem. His left eye flashed of a bright fiery red, and the process begun.

From the half corrupted gem, the shadow within it started to move around, faster and more chaotically with every passing second. The shadow took a distinctive red taint and started to hit the edge of the soul gem, as if trying to break free. It almost seemed alive, if it wasn't for the fact that it was obeying the will of the large incubator.

Then there was a crack. Just a small crack in the gem, but which allowed the pain to escape. It started to spread around the gem in a cloud of darkness, trying to build itself a labyrinth and a witch form, but it wasn't a fully developed witch. It wasn't at its full potential, and so failed to build its barrier. The solidified grief couldn't live without the magic it came from, without its soul gem. So it restructured itself around its life source, trying to take on a stable form. The gem started pulsating like a beating heart, slowly disappearing in the mass of shades.

"This... is ugly." It was the first word that came to Jyubey's mind to describe the thing that was taking form before him. "It wastes precious energy by accelerating the transformation process. It's not effective."

"Don't be mistaken, incomplete one. Those things are not batteries like mere witches."He turned around to face Jyubey, his eye still shinning like a blood drop in the darkness. "They are weapons."

At the same time he said that, the process of the first gem finished. The being of grief and despair that now laid on the floor tried to stand on a knee, then on both of its soft legs. In the darkness of the day, another pair of eyes flashed red next to Hachibey's. A set of eyes in the middle of a young, pure, childish face.

.

(||—||)

.

The next morning, Akemi woke up stiff once again, but she was quickly getting used to bruises and barely noticed. Her hair was a real mess, but for the first time in ages, she had slept well and without worries. It was still early and so she decided to let Mitchiko sleep a bit more.

She took a steaming hot bath, which help with her stiffness, and then employed to brush her hair into her two characteristic braids. The calm reigned in Eden in the morning. She could hear the whisper of the wind across her land and some early birds singing for her. She made breakfast appear, hot cereals with fruits, and glanced through the window. She had considerably reduced the size of her world, as Homura suggested, and immediately felt a weight lift from her mind. It was now only a few thousand feet square, just enough for the house and a garden. Still as beautiful as ever though.

After having finished her cereals, she took Homura's shield and warped to her house. She rang once and waited for the door to open.

When it did open, a few minutes and ringing later, Homura was in a shape Akemi never saw her before. She had irritated eyes with large pocket under them and was still in pyjamas even though it was almost time for her to get going to school. Akemi's smile turned into a worried frown. "What happened to you?"

"Hi Akemi-san." That was hardly an answer, but she didn't felt like thinking about her and Madoka's misfortune right now. Also, seeing how Akemi beamed the instant before, she couldn't bring herself to tell her yet another bad news. At least this way, one of them three deserved to have a rest. "Sorry, bad night sleep..." She rubbed her eyes to support her lie, and immediately could see Akemi's relief.

" 'You sure?"

"I'm fine..."

"Okay. I just came to give you back your shield." She said, holding it in front of her. "You lost it right before..." She stopped. They both knew the circumstances all too well.

At the sight of the shield, Homura's eyes lightened up, furious, desperate, with impossible envy. There was an escape! This world was doomed; there could be no future for Madoka here. She needed to start anew, to try again, to make all this pain and suffering vanish. With this shield, she'll be able to see Madoka smile once again, to be happy with her, to get a better future than this hell... Her hands stretched out to it. Every fiber of her body demanded the artifact, the relief and hope it'll bring her, the power she missed to save her friends. She could just take it and leave away for a better world...

But she didn't. Her outstretched hands gently push back the shield in Akemi's care, even though she wanted it with all her might, even though she knew this act was the last of her journey. "No. This... it's yours now." It was unbearably painful, yet the voice of reason in her head stood stronger than her impossible desire. "I give this to you."

"What? You can't... but..."

"I'll stay here with Madoka." She looked up from the shield and into Akemi's eyes. This was what Kyubey had suggested once, and even if she hates him to no extent, every time he had given a piece of advice, it later was proven to be the right choice. She hated to admit it, but this was definitely the best thing for Madoka. "You go back and help the other me save Madoka. I'll stay here with her, and help her from here."

"But... why? Why me? Why isn't it you that goes back?"

"Because..." she started, but couldn't find any argument other than _I can't_ to match. So she simply repeated, low and tired: "... because..."

Akemi seemed to understand. She considered the shield, and then Homura, and then the shield again. "I thrust you. If you tell me to go, I'll go. I once said I'll protect Madoka as best I can, and I intend to keep this promise. But I must ask something from you in return." She looked back at Homura, ready to give her a responsibility of her own. "Take care of Mitchiko for me."

"I'll do my best."

.

(||—||)

.

Being reminded by Akemi that there was school today, Homura dressed up and got ready without passion. Her every moves were slow, mechanical, monotonous. School felt so distant, like a reality apart. It all seemed futile, inappropriate and weird to concentrate on such ordinary matter as math and geometry. Nevertheless, this was the last remains of something akin to normal life she had. It was the only thing that prevented her from getting lost in the abyss of the world of Puella magis, the only thing that kept her attached to a reality other than that of a witch's labyrinth.

Other than saving Madoka, her life had lost all meaning.

She walked to Madoka's house as if it was any regular day of school, trying to follow an old habit that seemed far too distant today. She didn't want to think about what had happened at her house, about the dead bodies and broken girl she knew to find there.

She didn't want to think, period. Thinking yield so much suffering... So she locked her mind behind monotony, letting her body take the steps for her, letting it ring at the door and call for Madoka, letting it take all the place so she could simply forget that anything happened.

The door opened by an inch, just enough to let Madoka peek at her visitor, and slammed back shut as soon as she recognised Homura. She was still visibly angry at the black haired girl. Couldn't blame her though.

"Madoka, open the door." Homura heard her own voice as if it was someone else speaking, someone far, far away, who didn't put any intonation or life in it. It even took her some time to realise she spoke at all.

The door slowly opened, reluctantly revealing Madoka in the exact same clothes as the day before. She looked as much of a zombie as Homura.

"Are you ready?" Homura asked.

"... Ready for what?"

"For school. We're late."

Madoak didn't make a move to get readied. She looked at Homura with an expression of deep incomprehension, as if the words she was speaking were completely unintelligible. Then, something clicked and the meaning of her sentence reached her.

"If you're ready, then let's get going."

Madoka's feet made a step forward, hesitantly, then another. She started walking, not caring about the door left wide open, not caring about her lack of school books or her inappropriate uniform. Her feet kept pushing her forward, out of her control.

When she passed Homura, she only said: "Stop ordering me around." Those were the only words the two of them exchanged on their way to school.

.

(||—||)

.

They arrived late, yet neither of them cared in the least. They climbed up the stairs of the glass building and arrived in front of their classroom, mostly empty on the other side of the transparent wall of the corridor. There weren't even half of the usual students, and Kazuko Saotome, the teacher, was also absent. They were all sitting there, not talking, not actually doing anything other than waiting.

In the classroom was Hitomi. As soon as she spotted Homura and Madoka, she walked out of the classroom to greet them. When she was close enough, she hugged Madoka in her arms, simply to feel her all alive and sound. "I'm glad! You're safe Madoka-chan! And you too Homura-chan! I was scared something happened to you two..." She took a few steps back, her expression turning to deep worry. "Do you have any idea what actually happened yesterday?"

Homura glanced at Madoka, trying to exchange a look with her, but she didn't turn nor react. She was completely absent minded.

"... No. We don't..."

"That's too bad... It's really starting to freak me out! More than half of the school, teachers and students, didn't come today." She looked back inside the classroom, looking at the students there that just stared into empty space as if waiting for something to happen. "Even though I'm the class representative, I'm at a lost to what to do. There shouldn't even be school in such conditions..."

"There wasn't any notice to say that school was off today?" Homura asked, with fake concern in her voice.

"There would have been one, if only someone in charge showed himself. The only reason why some students stay here is because they are waiting for those they know to show up so they can confirm they're alright. You can stay with us if you like, but otherwise you'd be better to go back home with your family."

.

(||—||)

.

Homura was back outside with Madoka, staring at the sky as if the solution to her problems laid there. What was she to do? She had no school, no family, no friends outside of the circle of Puella magis, and no escape anymore. Her life was meaningless, without any goal that would have helped her take the next step forward. And to add to all that, she was the one that killed half of the town, the one that forced the school to close, the one that took away her friend's family...

She was the only responsible for this hell.

After a few minutes of wait, seeing that Homura wasn't going anywhere soon, Madoka started to walk away.

"Madoka..."

"Don't. Say. Anything." She turned her ring into the egg shaped gem, so dark that light wasn't reflected on it anymore. "I came to school, just like you ordered me to do. Now, I can walk away."

"Where..."

"Don't. Follow. Me. Don't. Talk. To. Me." She held her gem in front of her, as if trying to locate a witch, and just walked away, leaving Homura behind.

Now, Homura had truly lost everything. Even Madoka had walked away. She was left alone, all alone with her own loneliness and void. Madoka had left; Akemi will leave; this town was dead. There wasn't a soul in sight, no more cars or passerby in the streets and those that were left will soon leave. The whole world had stopped turning.

She was all alone in a meaningless world that she created herself. Alone with a single last gun.

.

(||—||)

.

Madoka walked for a long time, trying to detect a witch's presence. It was the last thing she could do, the one thing she had been denied for so long that she could now do without any worry. It was her last duty, the last thing that prevented her from falling in insanity. Or was she already there?

She just walked, absent minded, for more than an hour before she felt anything. She didn't hurry to get to the witch, enthusiasm having long since vanished from her. She merely turned into her magical outfit, the pink of her dress slowly getting tainted in black, and jumped on the roofs. From there she saw the witch's labyrinth, far away in the distance. Not taking the trouble of actually going in and target the witch directly, Madoka just took her bow and aimed at the whole barrier instead. She didn't care how much magic it would take to achieve that; she had an unlimited supply.

She shot and the whole sky turned pink. The next instant, the barrier had disappeared.

She slowly walked to the place it had been. Without any surprise, she found a naked girl there, unconscious among the garbage. A former Puella magi, about her age.

Now, what to do with her? She could bring her home; let her live in the place that saw her family die with the bodies and the smell. But even if she did take her home, she couldn't care for her, couldn't help her, couldn't give her a meaning in life. She probably had no other place to live, no reason to live at all, and now Madoka had taken her away from the only way she could live. As a witch.

Madoka really wanted to help her, but she knew it would be in vain. So she walked away, leaving the naked girl to sleep in the garbage. She didn't want to think about when she'll wake up; it was only more suffering for her to bear. She didn't want to think about consequences anymore. Her feet just continued moving forward, her hand stretched out before her with her black soul gem indicating the way. She let her body do what it wanted for so long, getting pained each and every time she realised she couldn't help before moving on. There was no point, and she didn't look for one.

All she cared for was that absolute feeling of brokenness, of getting ripped in so many little pieces, yet unable to give in. And always, in her head, kept ringing Homura's voice:

_Don't give up!_

_Don't give up!_

_Don't g..._

.

(||/|\||)

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* * *

I'm probably going to hell for this fic... Everybody turning to Nietzsche wannabe... I wonder how many despair event horizon I crossed throught the story... Too many I think.

This chapter was longer than usuall, but it was because I didn't feel like writing two chapters on such a tone. I'm not saying the next chapter will be light, just not as depressing as this one. Or at the very least depressing in another way. Also, I'm pretty confident to finish this story in two chapters. I need to get a change of air. I start to feel depressed and guilty the more I write on Puella magi.

In this chapter, I tried to convey some things without addressing them directly, like Hachibey's brutality and the meaning of Homura's wish. I not sure I succeeded though.

So leave your comments, smile, go outside! Or watch some My little Pony for a change (that's probably what I'm gonna do for the rest of the day). And stay tuned for more!


	17. Chapter 17: Death and Memories

Chapter 17: Demons and Memories

* * *

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(||\|/||)

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"Umika, I'm back!"

Kaoru was in the entrance of their hotel room, removing her boots with one hand and holding their breakfast in the other. Recently, she was starting to feel claustrophobic in this tiny room with only two beds and a bathroom. At first she liked it; they were taking turns sleeping at two in one bed and they were spending most of the night chitchatting on their sheets, or on a comfortable formation of pillow on the ground.

That was when Kazumi was still alive.

Now, she needed some air. Umika and she could spend many hours without exchanging a single word after sunset, while before chatters were filling the air at that time. It felt more and more awkward, and, being a girl of action, she couldn't stand staying inside all day.

Now she rarely spent more than the minimum amount of time inside the hotel. She brought breakfasts and lunches and then she would spend the rest of the day outside, alone.

It felt so empty and sad here.

"...Hum..." Umika was still absorbed in her magic book. Since the _accident_ with Kazumi, as she referred to the event, she was spending more and more time reading and planning and stuff. She had spent more time talking with Jyubey in the last couple of day than in the rest of her life as a Puella Magi. She seemed unshakable, but Kaoru suspected this was her way of dealing with the death of their friend. Maybe it wasn't a sane way of doing it, but it was something nonetheless.

"..." Kaoru sighed. She had found her friend in the same position she left her in the morning. This was getting obsessive and ridiculous. "So, did you come up with something to trap them?" While talking, she took the plastic bag with donuts and two mugs of hot chocolate and placed them on the table, in front of her friend. She then sat on the bed, Umika taking hold of the only comfortable chair of the place.

"...Hum..." She didn't seem to notice the presence of the blond girl. Her eyes were transfixed on the glyphs she amassed since the beginning of her adventure. She flipped a page, still not completely aware that someone was waiting for an answer.

BAAM!

Surprised by the sound, she looked up from her reading to see that Kaoru had slammed her fist on the small table. She was angry.

"Kaoru? I'm bus..."

"Umika! Stop for an instant! You've been reading this damned book for days now!" And this was showing. Umika had neglected a bit her hygiene, and was severely cutting her sleep time. Seeing she now had her attention, Kaoru calmed down a bit. "You need to get out, to change your mind, to take a break. This is just getting absurd!"

"I can't." She brought the book back in front of her. "They can destroy Earth if not stopped."

"I know that! Geez, how many times do you repeat this each day?" Kaoru made a wide gesture to show her exasperation. She was saying the exact same thing in each and every discussion they had this week. "It's just that you're not doing any progress at all."

"Yes I do." She replied, hidden behind her spellbook.

"Ok, so let me ask again. What did you come up with?"

Umika looked at her, severe. "I have made progress. You'll know when the time comes."

She had also been repeating this in every exchange. Kaoru had long since stopped to believe it. "You didn't find anything did you?"

"Yes I did."

"*sigh* If you're not getting any result, let's just go out there and kick their but. As things are now, we are just wasting time when we could just finish them off easily."

"Last time we went there without a plan, we lost Kazumi." As soon as she spoke Kazumi's name, her expression changed slightly to a frown and a sad look. The wound was still fresh in her heart. "I... don't want to lose you too."

Apologetically, Kaoru came closer to Umika and took her hand. "I know. But shutting yourself in here won't do any good, and it won't resolve anything." She took a deep breath, not knowing what to say to bring her back to her senses. This obsession was slowing driving her crazy. "If... if it's too hard, we can stop. This is not exclusively your responsibility, so I would understand if you decide to quit now. No one is asking you to save the world if you feel like you can't."

Her voice had a tone of worry and profound caring. All Kaoru had ever asked was for her friends to live happily. Was it too much to ask to just live without any apocalyptic threat looming over their head? This had to stop somehow, soon.

Umika did not answer and instead returned to her obsessive reading.

On the table, the mugs were getting cold.

Breakfast today will have the taste of regrets.

.

(||—||)

.

In the soft red morning twilight, Isamu Kuro, a teenager ghost hunter, was walking back home from a long fruitless night. He only came to Mitakihara recently, attracted by the mysteries around it like a butterfly to a candle. Ever since he came here with his group of friends, his camera never left his side, ready at any time to catch the proof of the existence of paranormal activity.

To be honest, he didn't really believe in ghost before putting a foot in this town. He had just tagged along with his friends, thinking it'll be a fun expedition. Some in his group were taking this matter really seriously, so much in fact that he sometimes found himself bringing them back down to earth. What was not his surprise when he caught sight of a huge monster with thorns all around it, followed a few days later with another humongous floating one in the faraway sky! He succeeded in taking some pictures, but more importantly, he was hooked by the thrill of seeing a ghost firsthand.

Now he couldn't stop. He wanted more, wanted to understand more, to see more, to get this thrill again. So he was on the lookout, walking through the streets where the monsters had appeared for anything out of the ordinary. Other than the fact that this part of the city was completely desert, which was strange in and of itself, nothing caught his attention. Maybe his friends had had more luck in their search...

In fact, he wondered where they were. It's been some time since he was on his own, walking through the empty streets. Sure, they were probably in some other part of the city, covering other grounds and coming up with their own mysteries, but still. He wouldn't say no to some company. This started to get creepy, and strangely, he loved it. This creepy feeling of being all alone in a hunted part of the city, abandoned by everyone who was sane enough to notice the danger of such paranormal activities...

With the rising sun, some people made their way out, opening what store they had or distributing the newspaper. It was of those people that even though a catastrophe had stricken the city had nowhere else to go, nothing else to do than what they did before. It wasn't much, but it dissipated Isamu's fears. He felt relieved to see the light of the day and the presence of human beings around him. So much for tonight's hunt...

Tired, he went to buy a coffee. He actually wandered quite far away from where he and his friends were temporarily staying. He'll probably need a taxi of some sort...

It was then that he noticed something strange. He turned his head from the manager of the store to look through the window. There was someone...

"280 yens." Said the old man, giving him his small cup of coffee. Isamu quickly putted the money on the counter and walked a bit over to get a better view.

In the street, there were two or three girls completely dressed in black. It wouldn't have caught his attention if it was only for that, but they were dressed as though they were cosplaying, with weird revealing dresses and ornaments. They even had fake weapons and red lens to complete their costume. Cute, and quite cool in fact; until you looked closer.

There was something about them, something powerful and vibrant that prevented Isamu from looking away. They were _mesmerizing_! They were all beauties; full of grace and with such a charm radiating from them that you couldn't do anything but fall for it. From deep witting him, he felt the urge to care for them, like a father would for his newborn child. At that precise moment, Isamu knew he was lovestruck. He desired that small pretty perfect face whose white skin made snow look filthy; he wished to be able to touch the taller girl next to her, to feel her in his arm, frail and delicate like crystal; he needed those deep red eyes to stare at him for every second of the rest of his life, time stopping in this divine stare.

And then the charm broke off, and screams resounded in the evening. He blinked a few times, just now taking notice he had walked with many others and was part of a circle of people around the tree angels, and then it was chaos. People started to run around, screaming murder at the top of their lungs, while others just like him stood frozen by the display before them.

Two of the three girls —the older of which didn't have more than 10 years old— had just jumped on a man with a screech, tearing his limbs off and biting off patches of skin and muscle, revealing the bare bones underneath. The man's screams echoed that of the dark beauties, until they reached his heart and ripped it off. And all this time, the third girl simply watched, envy showing in her eyes, before grabbing someone herself.

It was then that running seemed like a good idea to Isamu.

As he ran away, he saw a few more shadows shift out of some alleys, attracted by the scent of blood like hungry sharks. People were dropping like flies, screaming barely long enough to make their silence unbearable.

The most terrifying part was that those girls felt way too human, too perfect, too pure while they were eating their prey alive. Isamu couldn't bring himself to think of them as demons, but as his own daughters whom he could forgive anything. He felt that the second they would be up again, staring back at him with that mesmerising gaze of theirs, the second they would look like human beings again, he would forget all the blood on their face and would forgive them as if it was just a little misbehaviour; and it was that thought that pushed him forward: the sane though that simply looking at them would be the end.

But unfortunately, his eyes meet ones of an angel. And she was... familiar.

"Sa... Sachiko? Is that you?"

His eyes were fixed on a small girl that was slowly walking his way. He remembered her as one of his group's most fanatic ghost catcher, always too energetic for her own good; a little girl always in her corner trying to convince anyone and everyone of the existence of otherworld beings. Nothing compare to the black dressed gothic girl, red eyes as deep as the feeling of love they created over him, with the scythe hidden behind her back.

"W...Where have you been? Wh... What happened to y..."

She was now so close he could smell the delicious fragrance she exhaled, which made his head spin. Her face came beside his, and he froze as her mouth brushed against his ear, almost sensually.

She could feel his soul so close, beating under all that flesh, under muscles and bones. Such a delicious soul! She could simply reach out to it and grab it and then she would delight of this delicacy, but she restrained herself, barely long enough to purr a single sentence to his ear.

"Do you believe in ghost now, Isamu-_sama_?"

.

(||—||)

.

And on the side, watching everything unfold from the shadow of the morning, a little being was thinking. These half-witches were a threat to his plan. They were still weak, but that would soon change with all the souls and energy they were currently collecting. Before long, they'll start to hunt bigger preys, preys with more soul and more despair.

Something like Puella Magis...

He turned around and left, leaving behind him countless bodies and death and angels feeding on both. He maybe had a few hours, maybe a day before those abominations seek more than mere humans.

He needed to finish what he started.

He needed to finish his Avatar of despair.

And then, Madoka's house came into view.

.

(||—||)

.

"Now, Mitchiko-chan, are you ready?"

"Yes!"

Akemi and Mitchiko finished packing what little stuff they had and got ready to say their goodbyes to Eden. Earlier this morning, Akemi had explained patiently that she needed to go elsewhere for a time, and that Homura would take care of the little girl. She seemed to understand that something was happening, but didn't complain too much. Only she didn't realise this was a farewell from Akemi, that she wouldn't be able to see her in the future.

It was hard for Akemi, knowing she was abandoning her friend and that Mitchiko wouldn't be able to see her again. Well, at least she was in good hand. There wasn't a better guardian than Homura, so she'll be safe no matter what.

_But look on the bright side! You'll have another chance to save Mitchiko in the new timeline!_ She was already planning ahead of time what to do, what to fix when she'll come back. First, she'll save Mitchiko. Then, she'll have to take care personally of the witch of Hotaru Masami. This grief seed was necessary to have enough power to save Mami later. Then, she'll talk to Jyubey in the place of Homura, keeping the animosity between them and the 'executioners' to a minimum. After that, this, and then that. There was so much to do, so much to fix! The more she thought about it, the more she was convinced that everything could go right, that it would be easy to avoid falling in the many despair traps and push forward for a better future. Homura will still have her powers, which alone will prevent many misfortunes. And this, and that.

She had the responsibility of that perfect future. It was this conviction that allowed her to say goodbye to Mitchiko and leave her here, out of her reach. She needed to go away, for the sake of a better world.

"Okay." She said. "Say goodbye to Eden." As she said that, Kyubey jumped on her shoulder, not wanting to get trapped indefinitely in void.

Slowly, as if trying to keep a picture of what she was erasing, Akemi dissipated her world. It disappeared like a mirage, shifting ever so slowly until it mixed with reality, and then it was replaced with a street and Homura's home. Already, she felt nostalgic of the place.

"I'll miss the rabbits, desu."

Akemi pat her on the hair and started walking toward the door. "I'll miss you."

Mitchiko hugged her tightly, and then they moved on forward.

.

(||—||)

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There were knocks on the door. The lights of the apartment were all shut off and most of the furniture was still missing. Homura opened her eyes. She had been sitting against her bed for the whole night, her favorite position to escape torments and moan on her misfortune.

Now it was the bell ringing. What an annoying noise... Maybe if she didn't move at all, they'll go away. She didn't want to see anyone; she just wanted to stay there, on the floor, until death came to take her.

Unfortunately, she had forgotten that Akemi still had a double of the key.

"Homura-chan? Are you home?" Akemi called, from the bottom of the stairs as she and Mitchiko removed their shoes.

"Yeah..." She answered weakly. She wasn't sure Akemi heard her, but it didn't matter since soon she'll find out for herself. Knowing she needed to be kind of presentable to her visitors, she tried sitting in a more elegant position, one that didn't suggest that her mood was rock bottom. She more or less succeeded.

When the two came into view, she tried to give them a greeting smile, but failed at it.

"Another hard night?" Asked Akemi, as Mitchiko ran into Homura for a hug. It seemed every time Akemi came here it wass to find Homura depressed and gloomy. It was worrying.

"Sort of..." She didn't have the time to say anything else before the little girl in her arms pulled back with a huge childish smile across her face, pumped with energy and good mood.

"Let's have lots of fun, desu!"

Her enthusiasm was contagious, and Homura didn't need to force the next smile on her face. "Sure..." Mitchiko had that kind of presence; it was hard to not follow her mood. But then she thought back at Madoka and her face fell once again.

"..., we'll go shopping, and oh go see Emi-sempai, desu. Can we have a pet, desu-ka? I would really like a bunny or a kitten. They're so cute! And then we'll make pie and..."

"Mitchiko-chan." Akemi said, stopping the flow of suggestions coming from her little mouth.

"Yes"

"I'd like to speak with Homura-chan one on one, please."

"Oh, okay." She then went in a corner of the room and started to get settled with what little stuff she had: a few bags of clothes and a few books they bought recently. She then began reading, not listening to the conversation behind her.

Making sure Mitchiko wasn't listening, Akemi walked to where Homura was sitting, and sat next to her. "So, tell me what's wrong."

"Nothing."

"Homura-chan..."

"It's nothing."

Akemi sighed. "It's Madoka isn't it?" Homura did not answer and it was as good as screaming _YES_ out loud. She was staring at her feet with an empty look, probably reassessing what went wrong. "Is she okay?" Homura gave her a traumatised look, meaning this was far from the truth. It scared a bit Akemi. "Is she... dead?"

"No, but could as well be."

"I don't understand..."

Homura bitted her lips, not wanting to talk of this with Akemi. She was going away soon, so what did it matter? She needed not worry about her problems; she'll have way enough once she'll be in the next timeline. "I can't talk about it."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm protecting you. You need not to worry about my problems."

"Too late. I'm already worried. What happened to Madoka-chan?"

"You're persistent..."

"Because Madoka-chan is my friend and I care about her as much as you." Then, softer: "Can I do anything to help?"

Homura stared for some time. "Go away."

"What?" She said, surprised.

"I need to know you safe and to know that somewhere someone is taking care of Madoka better than I. I need to know that even if I fail, there is still hope somewhere for her, for me. I need you to go away and bring hope for the two of us; I'll stay here and carry both of our despair."

"..." Akemi didn't know what to say. She could see that what Homura was keeping to herself was eating her inside, destroying her a bit more every minute; but she could also understand that she was trying to prevent her from being corrupted the same way. She couldn't even begin to imagine what it was, and maybe it was better this way. "Can you really do that? Can you really bear all of this?"

"... yes?" Homura's lips were trembling as she answered the question, not looking at Akemi. It was as if she was trying to convince herself of that, but the way it was spoken Akemi knew she was lying. There was no conviction in her voice, just a blatant lie she wasn't even trying to cover up.

"Homura-chan..." She took her in her arms as she was breaking down in sobs, knowing she couldn't make it. How many times had this happen? How many times Homura needed comfort like right now and Akemi helped her through it? She was the one to endure the most pain for some reason, and at this though Akemi understood that all the while, it had been Homura that took care of them, even though her powers were failing her, even though she was constantly on the verge of giving up, even though she was in pain. She was strong all along.

"Homura-chan. I want to thank you."

"For what?"

"For everything." She said, reassuringly. "For absolutely everything. You can rest now; I'll take care of everything."

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(||—||)

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By the time Akemi left, everything was fine with Homura. She had cried a little, but she wasn't breaking down. Mitchiko was also there to look for her, weird as it may be that the youngest take responsibility of the oldest. Akemi had good hope that the two would get along and protect each other in times of need. Maybe it was this difference between her and Homura's life, the presence of someone to support you, that made such a huge difference in how hard they had it. Where would she be without Mitchiko-chan and Emi-sempai's help? She didn't want to think too much about it.

Outside, Kyubey was waiting as usual. She went toward him and took the shield from her belt, ready to leave after a last goodbye; one she thought wouldn't be as difficult as the others.

"Hey Kyubey." She said when she was next to him.

"So you are leaving?"

He was always talking in his young child voice full of intonation that didn't mean anything. For an instant, Akemi wondered what he really sounded and looked like without all this artifice to fool young girls.

"Yeah. I think it's time to go. There is any time left before the Walpurgis — me — appears in the afternoon of last month. So I guess I shouldn't wait."

"Why don't you wait until a time after Madoka turned you back into your current form? What is the rush?" He asked, tilting his head on the side.

"Because, usually — well... the kind of time travel I'm used to — when I go back in time I keep my soul gem."

"So? How is this relevant to the time to go back?"

She took a second to collect her thoughts. "Because when Madoka transforms someone back into a girl, that girl gets another wish. I think that if I go back at a time when I'm Walpurgis, and then changed back by Madoka, I'll get another free wish, but not if I return after she saved me." She looked down at him, thoughtful. "Am I making sense?"

"Somewhat. Time travel is a complicated stuff."

"Well anyway,..." she stood back up, holding the shield in her hand. "I was just saying goodbye, oh and don't mess with Homura-chan. Now I'm going."

"Wait." Akemi stopped her movement, curious what the little dude still had to say. "You should delay your time travel a bit."

"I already told you my reasons to go, and I can't really delay it much more."

"You can wait until latter this afternoon, when the witch will appear in Mitakihara."

"Why would I do that?"

"I don't know nearly as much about time travel as you do, but I do know a lot about witches. The though process of a witch is completely different from that of a human." He said. Taking his time, he elaborated his idea. "You experienced it firsthand when Madoka saved you back then. I suspect that fusing with your witch self during a long period of time will erase some memories, plans or otherwise mess up with your train of thought. I think the less time you spend as your witch self, the more you'll remember things that happened in this timeline."

This made Akemi think for a while. "You have a good point... so according to you, when would be the best time?"

Kyubey jumped on her shoulder. "I don't know. I shared what I came up to with you. It's up to you to decide."

"I guess a couple of hours couldn't hurt..." So with this said, she started walking to nowhere in particular. She just had a few hours to kill; it wasn't that big of a deal.

But it was for Kyubey.

It was barely enough time to finish what he started.

Akemi was playing in the palm of his hand.

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(||—||)

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A few hours earlier, still late in the night (or early in the morning, depending on how you look at it), Madoka had come back to her house, exhausted. She had been wandering aimlessly in the streets since the morning of the previous day, transforming every witch she came across and leaving them in many states of consciousness. She just kept moving forward until there was no more abomination in any part of the city, and a few miles around it. At this point her feet brought her back home, moving like an automaton. She passed the door left wide open, avoided the kitchen where the bodies still laid and went to her room, dropping like a dead weight on her bed. Her stomach felt completely empty, but she didn't care. There was no need to eat now that her soul gem could continuously feed it magic to keep it running. There was no need for many things now. She was just a living dead that would go on and on, knowing no rest for as long as she lives.

She tried closing her eyes and resting a bit, but it did nothing. Her exhaustion was purely psychological, and dreaming would bring no comfort. Letting her mind free brought back the pain of the lost of her parents, of her brother, of Sayaka and Kyoko, of Mami; it showed her back every time she failed, every time she let Homura and Akemi kill a witch, every time she watched her friends get hurt, every decision that ended with death and the loss of innocent people. It was hell. Hell in her head, hell outside too. There was no escape, but to stay awake, and not think to anything.

She opened back her eyes, intending to keep them open for as long as she could. There was some pressure on her chest, and a big white spot in her field of vision, but she didn't mind it until she associated it with a voice.

"Madoka? It seems that you are awake." Kyubey was directly above her, sitting on her chest and looking straight in her eyes. For a few seconds, Madoka debated if she should close her eyes again, or keep them open and ignore the unwanted intrusion. She chose the latter.

"Do you know what you are doing?" There was no answer to his question. The girl under him just kept staring the ceiling of her room, ignoring Kyubey completely. That didn't discourage him from continuing talking to her. "Madoka. I'm sure you do realise what will happen to all those girls you left in the dark." Still no reaction. "Some of them were raped in their sleep, one was killed by the cold and the two that awaken were so confused they are still wandering the streets as we speak."

Seeing that Madoka wouldn't answer him this way, he decided to us a more direct approach. His eyes flashed bright red and the world around them shifted to a scene in the street of Mitakihara. It was the same kind of magic he used before to show her Puella Magis through history, but this time he was using it to let her see through his eyes.

They were both standing in the middle of a road. If front of them was a girl of about eight years old, banging on a door. She was dressed whit a black plastic bag, the kind of which you use to put garbage in. She was screaming and crying, banging on another door and then another one to get someone's attention.

"Please... somebody... I need help..." She ran across the road to furiously knock at yet another door. "Help!... please help!... Hello? Anyone?... where am I?" She put her face against a window to look inside, but there was no one. The whole street was empty. She could scream all she wanted, nobody would come.

"Look carefully, Madoka. This is what you have done."

Madoka wanted to ignore the scene, to look away and stare at the ground or at a wall, but she couldn't. Kyubey was forcing her to look through his eyes, to stare at the desperate girl running around to get some help. Her whole attention was forced on that girl. Even worse than that, she began to _know_ that girl.

Her name was Rina Yuuki. She had contracted with Kyubey some thirty years ago, wishing to have friends. Just after her wish, Kyubey presented her to another Puella Magi and, just as she wished, they became friends. It was the first friend she ever had, since at the school she went everyone was mocking her poor family. When she made her contract, it was the first time she felt truly happy. But it didn't last long. Her friend had become a Puella Magi some time before her, and a few weeks after they meet each other, she transformed into a witch. And Rina had to kill her. And then she turned into a witch herself.

Knowledge started to surface to Madoka's mind, knowledge she couldn't have known. Madoka saw it all: the time they went to eat ice cream by a hot summer day, the long talks she had with her best friend, Rina noticing something was wrong with her, the fight where she lost both her friend and her humanity. It was everything Kyubey had seen her do, transmitted to Madoka without her consent. He had watched every single step of Rina's life!

"... stop that..."

"No, I won't." Kyubey said, in her mind. "This girl, Rina, doesn't know this place. She travelled a lot as a witch. She isn't even from this country. There is no way she will find her way in this huge city. To her it seems like she was just thrown a hundred years in the future. And what does she find here?" He gave a look to Madoka, accusing. "Nothing."

"... bring me back home. I don't want to know about her... "

"Let's go see another one." Kyubey said, not listening to Madoka's pleas. The world around them changed once again to watch another of his memory. Again, it was another girl, a bit older this time. She was curled up in a ball, naked, on the back seat of someone's car. The guy that was driving had a cigarette in his mouth and was talking to her in a harsh tone.

"Can't believe my fucking luck! Eh girl? You're mine now! You heard me? You're fucking mine bitch! I knew it would pay off to stay here! And look at all this looting! Fuck yeah!"

Memories of that girl came back to Madoka; memories that weren't hers and that she didn't want. She was trying to fight them, to think of something else or to break free from Kyubey's magic, but nothing worked. She was already starting to know her as well as she knew Sayaka, her most insignificant habits, her way of speaking, every instants of her life. Her name was... no! She didn't want to know her name! She didn't want any of this!

_Yua Mayu._

But she knew. She already knew everything Kyubey was about to say about her. She was another girl she 'saved' earlier in the day. Some random guy that happened to stay in town even after everything had happened found her. The rest, she tried to ignore it, but she knew it already. It all made her want to throw up! The fake memories were starting to affect her so much, she started to care for the girl the same way she would have if it was Homura or Mitchiko at her place. And she felt like she just betrayed a friend. And this guilt was added to all the sorrow she already bore before.

Kyubey was looking her struggle against the pain, the revelations and the feelings that were overwhelming her. Now he had her complete attention. "This is what you did. This is what your help got them. The only life they had was as a witch. Yua Mayu and Rina Yuuki died long ago, when their soul gem turned into a grief seed. Everything that came before that was their life, but what kind of life was it? One of pity and loneliness before I found them, and pain and death right after."

"... let me go..." Madoka was trembling now, still trying against all odds to not feel everything those girls went through.

But Kyubey wasn't listening to her. He just kept on showing her more, memories after memories, knowing that sorrow and pain would never break her soul gem. "These girls are actually quite representative of the average Puella Magi. There are many others like them all around the globe that are currently living something similar." At this he changed memories once again, this time feeding her of many hundred different lives each with her own history and load of grief.

"... STOP THAT!" Madoka couldn't think anymore. Every bit of her concentration was ordered to analyse the lives of the many thousand girls. She was seeing everything Kyubey had seen in his life in accelerated, but to her, it felt like each time she was living alongside that person, knowing everything there was to know about her and always watching her fall into despair and turn into a witch, or die. Some names she had heard before, like Cassandra, Cleopatra, Helen, Jane d'Arc and many others that got lost in history. She was seeing simultaneously thousands of years of history, and too many lives to count.

It had only been an instant for Kyubey, but already Madoka had forgotten that it was just his memories. She was lost in all those stories of Puella Magis. She was living the full years, seeing each and every detail and each time getting emotionally attached to the girl at the center of the memory, only to later grieve over her death.

In Madoka's room, the clock ticked a second.

Kyubey was there, his eyes still lighted up in their blood red color. He was still in complete control of his bodies and train of thought. This wasn't the case of Madoka, laying on her bed the eyes wide open, not moving. Her mind was elsewhere, lost in the memories of Kyubey, while her body laid there, empty for now.

Another few thousands memories.

The clock ticked another second.

A wide grin stretched on Kyubey's face. His intentions never were to bring her back to her senses. The little discussion he had about the recent events was just to weaken her emotionally enough for her to share their pain. He needed this aspect of Madoka back: empathy. That part of Madoka that made her what she was: caring, soft, unable to kill anybody and that made her want to save them all. It was this aspect of her that he was exploiting.

This, and the fact that she could withstand any amount of despair.

Whit this, he will create the biggest despair potential that ever existed, something akin to a god. Or perhaps even greater than that.

The clock ticked again.

He leisurely waved his tail, savoring the sound of it.

All of Earth's despair, of all times. In a single, weak little girl.

For the next twelve hours, she would see the memories he had of every single magical girl he ever had under his care. For the next twelve hours, she would see an unimaginable amount of pain, sorrow, depression.

For the next twelve hours, she would live hell.

And then, he needed to get somebody to go back in time and link everything together.

Oh, he could barely wait!

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(||/|\||)

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* * *

I said two more chapters didn't I.

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.

Sorry for the wait :\

I had what some of you may call a writer's block. The despair hold of this story drained me too much. I needed some fresh air.

You may not believe it, but since last November, I've been working on this chapter and the next one. It was a painful process. In a week, I usually wrote 100-150 words, reread what I had just wrote a couple dozens of times, got depressed, stop writing, change my mind, erase those few lines and started back again.

What really helped keep going was that I still got those messages when someone followed my work. I must give special thanks to Arthur091, who left a comment even after I had stopped showing any sign of life.

Thank you. Your support really helped.

I don't know if there is anyone left to read those last two chapters (and an epilogue :\), but I don't care anymore. I just want to be done with it. It's my own personal satisfaction to know this story finished.

The last chapter will be updated soon. It's already written, but I still need a few days to reedit it one last time.

So if anyone is still reading this, stay tuned t'ill the end :)


	18. Chapter 18: Liberation

Chapter 18: Liberation

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(||\|/||)

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Hidden in the shadows, Hachibey was looking at the development of his army. He had corrupted every soul gem he could feel in the town and now his minions were roaming the streets, gaining strength at the expense of what little humans had stayed here.

But he was also keeping an eye out for Madoka. Since late the other night, her power had grown exponentially, so much that there was now a chance that his creation failed at its task.

"... Kyubey, kyubey, kyubey..." That little guy was full of surprise. He just knew he would try something before dying. Whatever it was, Hachibey needed to disable it somehow before killing Madoka. He needed to be subtle and avoid all mistakes...

There were a grand total of six Puella Magis in this town. He listed them mentally, having accumulated some info on each:

Homura, who just did her wish and was the avatar of the Walpurgis Night. He didn't want to mess with her too much. The Walpurgis Night was an important resource, since only a Puella Magi stronger than it could kill it, which would create a witch even stronger right after. It was a way to naturally select better and stronger witches.

Then there was Akemi. Powers: small scale space control. She too would become the mighty witch one day, but Kyubey was strangely protective of her. He always had one of his agents on her shoulder or walking by her side. Also, he was actively trying to avoid a meeting between her and the half-witches. Hachibey wondered if she was in any way related to his plan...

Then, it was Madoka. The problem, the biggest irregularity. Kyubey had done something to her that allowed her despair potential to increase to impossible amount without causing her to transform. He needed to know how he did so, and how to counter it.

That's where Umika comes in. Head of the Pleiades, she is expert in mind magic and analysis of magical properties. Her powers and efficiency would be a great help against Madoka.

Looking through another body of his, he watched her stay in her hotel room all day, not really achieving anything with all that free time. Hachibey needed her powers... but not the girl.

His left eye lighted up in a bright red. One half-witch was near the hotel. _It is time to kill._

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(||—||)

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Akemi was taking her time to go downtown. She had decided to go see the pet shop one last time and to say goodbye to Emi-sempai. She went to the bus station and waited for a ride, making small talk with Kyubey in the meantime, but after over an hour, no bus came.

There also wasn't any car or anyone in the streets or on the sidewalk.

"Where is everybody?"

Kyubey preferred to keep shut. If Akemi changed her mind as to the hour she will go back in time, it could be a huge problem in his plan. Better keep it the way it was.

Seeing that the bus wouldn't come, she decided to walk the long way to the store. As she crossed streets after streets, she noticed that the town was completely empty. Granted, she had been kind of isolated all this time in Eden and maybe she missed and important show or something, but this was just ridiculous. It was starting to give her the creeps.

"Kyubey, is there an event of some sort where everyone is gathered?" She was throwing glances all around, trying to find the smallest clues of where they could all be.

"There was indeed an event that emptied the streets." Perched on her shoulder, he was also on the lookout, but not for the same thing. Through his agents, he was constantly keeping track of Hachibey's progeny. The last thing he wanted was an encounter between them and Akemi. In the case it happens, he wouldn't give much for her life.

After another half hour of walking, Akemi started to get the feeling that she was being watched. There were shadows moving at the corner of her field of vision, about a few blocks away if what she saw was any indication of the distance. However not once was she able to clearly identify what it was.

"Kyubey?" She asked, starting to get scared.

"Yes?"

"Am I being followed?"

"Yes."

She couldn't feel a witch in the zone, nor a familiar for that matter. She recalled the two remaining Puella Magis that they had fought in the last days, and got ready to battle if necessary, facing the general direction from where she saw the shadows.

"You might consider running away now." Said Kyubey.

"Why? I can take those two Puella Magis."

"They are not Puella Magis, and they are certainly not two." They were coming closer. He needed to get Akemi out.

"What?"

"No time to talk." Those creatures were already busy with somebody else, but it wasn't safe to stay around. As soon as they would feel they had the advantage over her, they would strike. "They won't attack for now, but I suggest you don't stay here when they change their mind."

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(||—||)

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Umika was running in the streets, running as fast as she could to save her life. Left, right, left, right, she ran and ran and turned in small alleys to loss her pursuers. She didn't know how many they were, where they were and how they managed to keep the pace, but they did, and no matter what she did she still found them lurking around in the shadows.

_Where is Kaoru? _They were together earlier, but split when they understood they were outnumbered. She really hopped she was okay and that she had been able to hide or something. _Those _things_, what are those _things?

A girl dressed in black dropped from the roof in front of Umika and started to flail around with her weapon, a large chain of dark metal. Umika had only a second to react.

"Rosa Phanta..."

CRACK! Too late. The chain went crashing on her head, smashing her in the ground with enough strength to make the concrete explode.

The black girl came closer to the dead body, looking for a delicious soul gem to eat, but the body slowly vanished into thin air. It was just a clone, meaning the real Umika and many other clones were still running around, trying to escape.

The half-witch couldn't wait. The souls of simple humans were no longer enough to satiate her. She wanted to have a bite at the soul of a magical girl. She could only imagine its taste, richer, and with so much more subtlety than that of mere humans! Oh no she couldn't wait!

So the half-witch gave chase once again, picking up the scent of her quarry and following its trail until she found another Umika. Her sisters were also hunting right now, and it was a race to see who will get to eat that precious soul first. The Umika in front of her tried fighting with her double edge sword; swinging and slashing as best as she could at her opponent. The fight lasted a few minutes, until Umika slipped up and allowed for an opening. She was getting tired of running around, and her strength was leaving her the more she made clones of herself.

The chain found it way around her neck. This one was hanged.

Another body vanished.

She couldn't escape indefinitely.

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(||—||)

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The real Umika was still on the loose. Her opponents never left her any time to breath, and they didn't seem to slow down either, meaning they were constantly catching up. Whenever they would reach her, she would create another set of clone to distract them barely long enough for her to gain a few hundred meters on them, and then they would give chase once again and the whole process would repeat itself.

Through her clones she figured that they were about a dozen of those _girls_, whatever they were, that were chasing her; maybe more all in all. They all looked like dark versions of Puella Magis, with the same strength and the same speed and powers. Individually, they were each stronger than your average witch, but as opposed to them, they did not drop grief seeds when they died. Umika had succeeded to kill one of them at the very beginning, but now it was as if they were gaining power by the hour. Not a single one of her clones could actually lay a mark on them in face to face battle! The fact that she was quickly getting tired of running around also increased the difference in power between them.

She needed to get out!

She needed to leave this town!

_Kaoru, can you hear me?_ There was no answer. _We need to leave this hell of a place. I'm leaving through the north. Are you there?_ She was repeating the same message in her head, again and again hopping that Kaoru would answer eventually. Perhaps Jyubey was busy and couldn't relay the message? Or perhaps he wasn't even around anymore? But where could he be?

_Damn it!_

She was getting close of the boundary of the city when something tackled her from behind. She didn't have time to get back up that a strong hand firmly grabbed her by the neck and slammed her against a wall. Still holding her, the half-witch lifted her arm until Umika's feet left the ground.

The girl who was holding her was dressed all in black like the rest of them. She was a bit shorter than Umika, with shoulder length blond hair, a frail looking face and a large scythe in her other hand.

Umika started to kick the little girl, unable to breath. That girl had some tremendous force! She didn't have any difficulty holding her opponent in the air with a single hand. Annoyed with all the kicking, the half-witch stuck her scythe in the wall, so that it restrained both legs of Umika. Having now a hand free, she reached for the nun's forehead, where the soul gem rested. Umika was starting to panic, and she didn't have much strength left to fight her. She didn't have time to pull any stunts, except maybe...

She raised a hand in front of her aggressor's face and found enough breath to call one more incantation. "...In..fer..no.."

The abomination of a girl reacted in a split second, changing the trajectory of her hand to grab Umika's arm and raise it in the air before a torrent of flame escaped from it. In the light of the brazier, her eyes seemed to be made of liquid magma, waves of fire dancing in the depth of her stare. She was enjoying this.

The flames went beside their target, only burning a few hairs and nothing else. Then, Umika felt something strange at the place she was being held. Her magic was spilling out by her wrist, exactly at the place the black girl was holding her. The flames' intensity quickly weakened while the other girl absorbed all that magic. When the flames stopped, the black girl shifted her hold on Umika's arm and swiftly broke her wrist.

She screamed in agony, pain flowing from her arm through her entire body until there was nothing else than the pain. Umika tried to endure it, her life depending on it, but the next thing she knew, she was feeling a burning sensation on her forehead. The other girl had grabbed the gem and was tearing it from her. It didn't hurt nearly as much as her broken arm and she could have missed it if she wasn't paying attention.

But she knew the pain wasn't representative of the importance of the wound. She didn't care how much pain she needed to withstand to stay alive, but she was ready to take any amount. With her good arm, she grabbed the threatening arm and tried to prevent it from taking her soul away.

What she hadn't realised was that she already lost her soul gem. At the touch of the black girl's hand on her soul gem, Umika's magic was drained from her. Her white nun outfit returned to some mundane clothing; her many clones scattered around the city all vanished at once and all her strength left her.

All her life force was quickly absorbed by the demon in front of her.

She was just any normal twelve year old girl now.

Her aggressor brought the gem to her nose, smelling the delicious fragrance of the soul of a magical girl. Then, slowly as to appreciate every moment of this meal, she opened her mouth and ate the gem like it was candy.

She crunched the gem with her teeth, freeing the very essence of Umika and swallowed it.

Umika's body went limp.

.

(||—||)

.

"Come. This way quick!"

The black Jyubey turned at a straight angle, quickly followed by Kaoru. The little cat alien seemed to know exactly where to go, and up to now they had managed to avoid the half-witches. This was in the calculations of Jyubey: he needed to distract the monsters long enough to let one of his girls finish her work here. Unfortunately, Kaoru wouldn't last long against them, so he needed to sacrifice Umika. He led her in the middle of the pack of hungry hyena and left her at the hands of those abominations. He then cut all links to her, telepathically or otherwise.

She never knew what had happen. Neither did Kaoru.

"I think we lost them. Are we safe now?" Asked the soccer girl.

"Almost." A few seconds later, he stopped at a small park in the middle of a residential ward and allowed Kaoru to catch her breath. Delicate black threads were lying all around on the floor, covering the sand of the park. It almost looked like hair. "Here we are safe. For now."

She sat on the metal structure of the park, not noticing the black things, and took many deep breaths. "Where are we?"

"We are close to the house of the pink girl, Madoka. Those girls won't come here for some time."

"How can you be so sure?"

"They only attack what they know they can kill." Calmly replied Jyubey.

Kaoru looked at the house, unsure what to do. "Say, what exactly are those _things_?" The first impression she got from the half-witch was that they were more like beasts and hunters than cute little girls. All dressed in black, with those bloody red eyes...

"They are incomplete witches." Started Jyubey. "They are the result of an artificially accelerated maturation of soul gems."

"What is that supposed to mean? That _you_ created them?"

"Not me. A third incubator that wanted things to be done his way."

Kaoru held her head in her hand. "Why are things so complicated?" Now there was a third party thrown in the mix, with his share of magical girls — or demonical girls — to keep track of. Where were they? What were they doing? What was she to do now? So many questions that probably will go unanswered. "Where is Umika? Is she safe?"

"Don't worry about her." Jyubey answered, avoiding the question. "I'm keeping surveillance over her. If I brought you there, it's to do what you were asked at the very beginning. You see the house there?" He asked, pointing Madoka's house with one of his ear.

"Yeah? That's... her house?"

The amount of black tendrils on the floor was increasing the closer she looked to the house. It seemed like they all originated from it and went slowly crawling out, covering everything around. Kaoru could see them over trees and walls like some kind of overly invasive vine. It did not look reassuring.

"Yes. This is the house of Madoka. And this," he said, pointing some threads, "is what she is becoming. Everything will end if you were to take her soul gem. If you succeed to do this, I'll be able to negotiate with the third incubator to disable the half-witches, you'll be able to go back to Asunaro and you won't be bothered by me again for a long time." He turned his head from the House and looked at Kaoru. "All you need to do, is go there, and take that soul gem."

She sighed and stood up. "Are you sure any of this will end? It seems to me like it went on forever!" She was sounding tired from the few last weeks of constant battle and stress. It's been so much time since she was here that the idea of there being an end to this seemed so unbelievable.

Jyubey answered her, trying to sound reassuring. "I promise it will all end."

She stood up, made her mind and started walking toward the creepy house. "Let's end this then."

.

(||—||)

.

The tendrils were everywhere, like a nuisance that took claim of every opening in the house. The front door was wide open, and so Kaoru carefully walked in, unable to keep down a shiver as she walked on the unstable carpet of dark hair. There was no way to avoid walking on them. The whole place was filled with those things!

Then, suddenly, she heard a scream and some trashing. It was coming from one of the rooms. She walked ahead of Jyubey, taking an offensive stance even though she was far from confident this was a good idea. Kaoru was starting to hesitate when another scream pierced the silence. She was now close enough to hear someone babble incoherently. She decided to take a peek inside the room, just to make sure.

"... dream... it is all just a dream... just another dream... isn't it?... Kyubey... It's all just a dream... nothing is real... isn't it?..."

Madoka was there, curled up in a ball, twisting and playing maniacally with the threads lying around her. Her room was so filled with them that none of the floor, walls, ceiling and furniture were visible underneath. The whole room was looking more like the inside of a black cocoon than a real room.

"It's just an illusion... none of this matters..."

Kaoru was starting to back off, thinking more and more firmly that this was a bad idea. This girl was giving her the creeps! She seemed so different from the useless pink magical girl she fought a few days ago...

However, she made a small noise when she slipped on the threads, giving away her presence.

"... why... still another girl... another memory..."

In the blink of an eye, Kaoru was slammed on the ground by the girl that had been crying in the room the instant before. Even though the large amount of threads acted like a cushion, Kaoru still felt the floor bang on her back. When she looked up, she saw that she was being held on the ground by Madoka, dressed in her magical girl outfit now more black than pink. Her soul gem, darker than any conceivable shade of black, was cracked on its entire surface and it was leaking a dark substance of the same texture as the tendrils around the house.

"...And yet, another one... Kyubey, I've had enough of it... You hear me? I'VE HAD ENOUGH!"

Madoka then started to slowly strangle Kaoru. The look on her face was so twisted that 'hysterical' couldn't even begin to describe it. She was still in her nightmare, still thinking that she was living another one of Kyubey's memories. How much had she seen?

All of it.

All of the lives of the Puella Magis that ever existed.

It had been too much.

"... Maybe I won't have to see your story this way..." She said, strangling harder. She got closer to Kaoru's ear and whispered, as if to share a secret. "... Kyubey... If you don't let go of me... I'll destroy you... I will break your memories and destroy you from the inside... I don't care if it's impossible... I'll find a way... I. Will. Kill. You."

There was a loud cracking noise in this morning tainted in blood.

.

(||—||)

.

The half-witches were gathering in the center of the town. There was no longer any human soul to feed on. All that was left were the magical girls.

Hachibey was thinking. He was thinking on the best way to deploy his troops. It was his first time dealing with such a powerhouse, and he was taking it as a challenge to succeed on the first try.

And he was fairly confident that success was his.

His red eye shone brightly, implanting his orders in his creations.

There were five magical girls left. One was with the target, and another one he didn't want to lose. That left two more to boost his ranks.

"Go my children. Go feed on the two. Do not touch the avatar of the Walpurgis, but any other are yours."

Almost immediately, every demon left the zone in unison, hunting the closest target they could kill.

All but one.

The only one that stayed was a young blond girl with a scythe.

"You, come with me."

He started to walk toward a certain house, his strongest asset silently following in his shadow.

.

(||—||)

.

The sun was high in the sky, marking the beginning of the afternoon. Homura and Mitchiko were warming some instant curry in the microwave for lunch. They had spent most of the morning getting to know each other better. For Homura, it had been a nice and appreciated break from her usual routine full of Madoka fuelled despair.

"... and then Beauty brought back the wrong ball! It was a big wonky ball, desu. With, like, blue stripes on it, in the woods. I don't know who it belonged to."

"She sure seemed to be a funny dog." Replied Homura, waiting in front of the micro-wave for the second plate to cook. "I wish I had had a pet before. Maybe I would have been less lonely." She said, with some regret in her voice.

The micro-wave beeped and they each took their plate before sitting somewhere. "A dog is really fun, desu. And Akemi showed me many other pets too! Like cats and birds and... _spiders_..."

Homura started to laugh before taking a bite of curry. "What? Some people actually have spiders as pet?"

"That's not the worst!" Mitchiko said, with a strict voice as if the matter was really serious. "Emi-sempai once told me, desu. Some people buy _crickets_ and they _pet them_!"

"Well that's just silly." Homura couldn't restrain a smile. "At least, a spider can live for a few years and gives off a sense of might and power. I could see myself with one, but a cricket? What kind of appeal do they have?"

"I think it's for their signing, desu, but I'm not sure." She was enjoying her talk with Homura. Starting to get hungry, she dug in her plate without any more waiting.

"That maddening noise? I think I would go crazy if I had to listen to their chirring all day long."

"I .*h*know..." She swallowed her bite before going on. "I think I would too, desu."

_Homura-chan! Are you there?_

"... That's why I prefer butterflies. They are so pretty, desu!"

_Homura-chan!_

Homura had clearly heard Akemi's voice. She threw a quick look at Mitchiko, but the little girl continued to talk as if she didn't hear anything. Maybe she didn't, actually...

"Mitchiko Shiori, please wait. I need to talk to Akemi."

She stopped talking and looked at Homura expectantly. Without talking, she moved her lips to form the sentence: "Say hi for me" before returning to her plate.

_Akemi, why are you still here? _Homura asked, now focusing all her attention on the telepathic discussion.

_Are you and Mitchiko-chan safe?_

Homura could hear some panic in the tone of her voice. _Yes, why?_

She heard a sigh of relief before Akemi replied. _Things are bad outside. Like,_ really _bad!_

.

(||—||)

.

Akemi was moving on top of many small buildings. She could feel the stares of her pursuers grow closer and more threatening as time passes. She had Homura's shield on her arm, ready if need be to escape this world in a split second, but she also wanted to know what was going on here.

Who were they?

How could she avoid this when she'll go back in time?

_Things are bad outside. Like,_ really _bad!_

She jumped to another roof, distinctly hearing Homura's reply. _How bad?_

Suddenly, as she was going to jump to another roof, three long energy claws sliced through the concrete from below, targeting her throat. Akemi barely had enough time to invoke a small disk she used as a jumping platform to abruptly change direction.

But the black girl was already there, following her movement with ease.

_So fast!_

_What's fast!? Where are you!?_ For an instant she had forgotten about Homura. The black half-witch with the eye patch was her main focus for now. Akemi briefly touched the shield, but then decided against it, thinking debriefing Homura was more important for now.

The black girl jumped toward her, her cat claws spread wide. Her speed was unreal, and it was the best Akemi could do to hide inside a magic bubble. The energy claws bounced on the shield, to the surprise of the aggressor.

Akemi needed to deal with her fast or else the others would catch up too.

Concentrating on the sphere, Akemi inversed it in such a way as to be outside and her opponent inside. Recovering from her shock, the black girl started to claw at the inside of the sphere, trying to find a way to get out. With another focused thought, Akemi changed once more the shape of her globe. From the inside wall she grew many needles and pierced her opponent from all direction.

_There, that should do._

_What are you doing right now?_ Homura was still there, waiting for an answer to her previous questions.

_Sorry, I was occupied._ Akemi started to walk away from the battle scene. _There are strange Puella Magis here._ She looked back at the girl she just fought and realized with fear that she was still moving. The needles that ran through her body were disintegrating one by one, the wounds closing up without any blood flowing out.

Then, the demon lifted up her head and for an instant she and Akemi exchanged one long good stare. There was a smile on her face as the disintegration was starting to affect the denser surface of the sphere.

It wouldn't slow her down for long.

.

(||—||)

.

"You are not in a dream."

Kaoru was still on the floor. Around her neck were small slivers of steel where the grasp of Madoka had broken her spell _Capitano Potenzas_. It was astonishing that with her bare hands she was able to cause this much damage to her steel form.

Still lying on the ground, Kaoru took advantage of her opponent's surprise by quickly grabbing Madoka's necklace before sending her flying against a wall with a powerful kick in the guts.

"Sorry to break it to you, but this is reality. Deal with it!"

Madoka just looked at her as if she couldn't understand what she just said, and then she caught sight of her necklace. Her expression dramatically changed, going from madness to _hope_. Her trembling lips curved slightly up in the beginning of a smile and tears of relief came to her eyes, all the while shaking in anticipation. She said, in the most pitiful and desperate voice Kaoru ever heard:

"Please... kill me... Quickly, before it's too late..."

She continued to sob silently, waiting.

Kaoru didn't know what to make of that last statement. Confused, she looked at the necklace she had stolen from Madoka. It was a simple pink necklace with a pearl of pure darkness attached to it: the soul gem. She didn't want to kill her, but Madoka seemed in so much pain that this act became more than killing, it became mercy. She couldn't help from feeling pity toward this weak and lost little girl.

The cracked soul gem felt so frail in her hand. It was still leaking its dark substance from its cracks, something like overflowing grief and despair, enough to take a physical form in the form of those millions of threads on the floor. This no longer was a soul gem; it was just a curse that would only bring sadness to all.

Kaoru closed her hand on the gem and crushed it to pieces.

Well, that's what she would have done if Madoka hadn't kicked her with enough strength to crush the walls in front of which Kaoru was standing in the split second it took for the soccer girl to apply enough pressure; forced against her will by a voice in her head that was constantly saying:

_Don't let yourself die._

Her soul gem fell delicately on the black web on the ground, its darkness mixing perfectly with this hellish floor.

.

(||—||)

.

Hachibey and his half-witch were outside Madoka's house when they saw the walls get blown to pieces. Kaoru was sent flying in the middle of the street, her fall somewhat softened by the sea of black threads that reached that far. He could see her struggle to rise up, failing and spitting out blood due to internal breaks.

_It was just another failed attempt of Jyubey_, he reflected. _What a weak delusional incubator..._

"Sachiko..." He said.

"Yes master." The black girl came forth knowing what she had to do. She had absorbed Umika's magic earlier, and now was the time to use it.

Without a single word from the black girl, black sigils appeared around Kaoru and Madoka and flied directly toward the half-witch, fusing with her skin.

This didn't go without notice.

Upon seeing Hachibey, Madoka's attitude change. She immediately stopped sobbing and trembling. All her attention was focused on him as she adopted an offensive stance.

"... Incubator..."

All her being was consume by hatred, pure hatred toward Kyubey and his siblings. In the blink of an eye, she summoned her bow and shot a beam of concentrated black energy, the energy of her hatred.

But the beam didn't hit its intended target. It was cut in half by a monstrous dark scythe. The dark metal seemed to glow, as if its strength and power were growing from the contact of Madoka's magic.

When the beam vanished, Hachibey and his progeny were unharmed, but such couldn't be said of the area around them.

Except where they stood, everything was eradicated.

The girl with the scythe was about to charge in and fight with Madoka, but then Hachibey interfered.

"Don't." As soon as the order was out, the half-witch was back at his side. "Let _them_ take care of that."

From the corner of her eye, Madoka noticed movement. She jump aside just in time to avoid a large spear thrown at her from a distance, but before she could catch her balance again she was swiped to the ground by a pair of large chains coming from the other way. This time, she couldn't react fast enough to completely avoid another spear which pierced through her shoulder and pinned her to the ground.

The pain would have knocked unconscious anyone but Madoka; since she could withstand any amount of pain.

"... he he..." Still on the ground, Madoka started to push upward with both arms. The spear was still stuck in her flesh, but as soon as she was on one knee, she grabbed the weapon and crushed it with her bare hands, before removing it completely. The wound instantly closed up and she could stand up once again. Her face was split in two with a smile; a smile without joy or sadness.

"... he he..." She looked around, acknowledging the six half-witches that were surrounding her. "...Try to kill me... If you can... he he..." She smiled to all of them.

It was a smile of pure madness.

.

(||—||)

.

"Strange Puella Magis?"

This was new, and Homura didn't know what to do of this information. Mitchiko was still watching her, waiting to learn about the exchange between the two Akemis.

_Shit..._

_Akemi? Is everything all right?_ Homura was feeling more and more preoccupied. She didn't know what was going on, but something big was happening and she wasn't aware of it.

_Yeah, I'm good. They are just freaking impossible to kill... I was worried they got you and Madoka-chan._ There was a pause as a thought hit her. _Have they gotten Madoka-chan!? She should have heard everything I said, but she didn't answer... Madoka-chan?_ She called out.

_I don't know._ Replied Homura. The urge to go check her friend's safety was growing by the minute. Finally, she couldn't take it anymore and decided to go, even after what happened last time she went to her house. _I'll go make sure she's okay. You, on the other hand, should not miss your window for time travel._

There was another pause in the discussion while Akemi was making her decision.

_You still need me here. Don't worry, I won't miss it._

"I hope not." Homura replied to no one in particular.

Next thing she knew, Mitchiko and her were closing the door of her house and were running toward Madoka's home.

.

(||—||)

.

A torrent of flames filled a small alley, barely missing the girl that turned the corner just in time. Akemi was trying to lose her pursuers, running through empty houses and hiding behind walls, but nothing seemed to do. The three half-witches that were following her didn't want to give up the chase.

"Akemi!" Kyubey was keeping the pace next to her. He was getting worried for her safety. The closer they got to their destination, the more the witches were aggressive. "They are catching up!"

"I'm still in control of this!" She replied, avoiding another blast of fire.

"No you are not! You will just get killed!"

"Shut up!"

In between two blasts, she materialized large orbs into the concrete and earth of the ground and then compressed them to the size of a penny. The matter inside the orb was condensed with incredible pressure and maintained that way by magic. She then made the small orbs orbit around her so she could use them as future weapons.

She had picked up quite early on that normal magic was mostly ineffective against the half-witches. They were able to absorb the magic they touched and use it to regenerate their wounds, although they could still be hurt by it. If it didn't kill them in a single hit, it wouldn't do anything. So she found a way to hurt them; an improvement of her usual needles.

Akemi jumped on the roof, a place where she could better dodge her first opponent's fire attacks. The second girl, the one with the claws and the eye patch, was there as she expected and she took a swing at Akemi with her energy claws.

But she didn't hit.

Instead, the half-witch was blasted away by a concentrated explosion of rock and dust from one of Akemi's glass marble. Once she created a marble, all Akemi had to do to use it was to open a small hole in its side and all the matter inside would be pushed out at an incredible speed due to the pressure. The damage wasn't caused by magic, so those demons couldn't regenerate it.

"See? I told you I got this." She said, turning to a late Kyubey.

"..." Kyubey looked back at the two other black girls who were making their way to the roof. He was unsure of what to say.

Not worrying nearly as much as Kyubey, Akemi hurried to the place the black girl got thrown back and found her lying on a broken rooftop, wounded beyond belief. She was moving weakly, as if she was trying to keep a hold on reality, trying to avoid falling into the inescapable darkness of death. She was barely conscious at all.

Without any second thought, Akemi willed another marble above the broken body of the half-witch and in a tremendous blast of debris, vaporized her opponent.

"I did it!" She exclaimed, quite happy of her exploit. It had taken her quite some time to come up with this strategy, and she was glad it worked.

The other two black girls, having arrived just in time to see one of their own kind get pulverized, didn't dare to come closer. Akemi looked at them with an air of superiority, trying to intimidate them into cutting the chase.

It seemed to work as the two half-witches fled away, probably plotting to ambush her later.

Akemi could finally relax a bit. The last hour had been a constant strain, constantly trying to avoid getting killed...

"You shouldn't rejoice to early." Said Kyubey, killing her mood. "Those kinds of attacks take way to much magic power from you to be used efficiently."

"Shhhh." Akemi looked at her soul gem on her hand. By the looks of it, she maybe had two or three other blasts, not nearly enough to engage multiple opponents at once. "_They_ don't know that yet."

.

(||—||)

.

The fight was reaching a new climax at Madoka's house. All the half-witches who were not currently chasing Akemi had gathered here in an attempt to take on Madoka. Lightning, swords, bullets, spears, fists, steel and chains were ravaging the area, trying to catch the elusive Puella Magi.

On her side, Madoka was keeping the pace. In fact, she wasn't serious at all. Repeatedly, she waited at one place for someone to give her the fatal blow just to dodge with incredible speed at the last second by way of her curse. She was trying to fight it, to fight that curse that kept her alive and strong. She didn't want it, she didn't want to live.

But her opponents couldn't keep up with unlimited magical potential.

Nobody could.

And as such she kept on living.

There were eight witches that were taking part in the fight, leaving only one by Hachibey's side: the black Magi named Sachiko. She was standing still, the eyes closed, looking through the information she recently received from using Umika's _Ex-file_. She was concentrating as hard as she could to find a way to negate Madoka's magic, to limit her one way or another so that her sisters could finish her. She had to navigate her distorted mind, probing deeper and deeper until she stumbled upon a certain memory.

It was a memory Kyubey showed her earlier, among many hundreds of thousands others, but that had affected Madoka more than any other. Over the death of countless teenagers, over the cumulated despair of every other and the inability to escape, was a face.

A face filled with tears, crying in the darkness of an empty room, screaming to a certain listener: _She mustn't! I WISH SHE COULDN'T BECOME A WITCH!_

The half-witch opened her eyes, a smile forming at the corner of her mouth. "This girl... she just wants to be put out of her misery." She said, realising the simplicity of this task.

Hearing her speak, Hachibey half turned in her direction. "Have you come up with something?"

"Yes." She glanced at the girl shrouded in darkness, fighting against her will before her. She had witnessed it all. Even the darkest moments of her friends.

Especially the darkest moments of her friends.

"I know how to free her." Sachiko said to her creator. Turning her head away so to better sense the position of the other Puella Magis, she added: "... And I know who I need to do that"

.

(||—||)

.

Homura was quickly getting close to _the_ house. She was afraid of what she would find there, in what state she would find Madoka or whether she'd find anything at all.

What if everything had vanish, just like the people of this city?

Deep in thoughts, she barely noticed that she was running way too fast for Mitchiko to keep up. "...hff... Nee-san!... Wait up!... hff."

Realising she was going too fast, she stopped and let Mitchiko catch up. The little girl was not a magically enhance super girl that could run for hours straight without rest. She was just a normal girl, and a young one at that.

When she caught up to Homura, Mitchiko sat on the ground, trying to catch her breath. They were losing precious seconds, which only made Homura more and more agitated, as if Madoka could vanish at any instant.

But then a voice she hated rose from the side of the street: "You are worried about Madoka, aren't you Homura?"

Kyubey was there. Not really a surprise, as he was everywhere. He was sitting leisurely and spoke as if he had been disrupted in his thoughts.

"Is she okay?" Asked Homura, coming a bit closer to him.

"She's far from okay, but such could also be said of you and Akemi." He started to lick his paw, not preoccupied in the least by anything that was going on lately. This behavior enraged Homura.

"I WANT ANSWERS!"

"And I want you to answer me." He replied, defiant. "Do you wish to involve Akemi in all of this?"

She tried to calm down a bit and glanced behind her to make sure Mitchiko was still there. The little girl was looking at them, clearly wondering why Homura had shouted. She needed to speak quieter if she didn't want to alarm her. "I don't even know what _this_ means!" She said, angrily.

"Don't tell me you already forgot what happened just after you made your wish." Reproached Kyubey.

Homura's face went pale. "Oh, it's about _that_."

Kyubey nodded before adding: "It got worse."

Homura's face became even paler, if such a thing was possible. "H..ow..?"

"You will see it when you'll get there. What I can tell you is that Madoka will die, and there is no way to avoid it." He stopped licking his paw. The subject was no longer unimportant. "One way or another, she dies, and I with her."

.

(||—||)

.

Madoka came crashing to the ground. Her opponents were getting stronger and stronger and they were wounding her more and more severely as time passed. Madoka could see two black girls she had almost killed earlier stand again, absorbing the dark magic contained in the threads all around. They were using her own magic to regenerate, and not only that, but they were learning as the battle progressed. Their attacks became more and more coordinated; they were starting to anticipate her every move and their defences were improving with every ounce of magic they absorbed.

And they were pushing her farther away at each assault.

She was well aware of her position relative to her house. Or more precisely, relative to her soul gem that fell in her house. Madoka was hoping that one of those girls would strike her with enough strength to push her out of the gem's range.

Then it'll be darkness and void, and she will be in no condition to oppose those girls.

And then she would finally die.

_Don't let yourself die!_

"Yeah, yeah. I know..." She stood up, having long since regenerated all her wounds. Her eight opponents were charging in from different positions. In the bunch, she guessed at least one or two would be able to push her out of the range limit. She was putting her hope on those few. "...But Homura... This doesn't count, right?"

.

(||—||)

.

"I won't allow it!" Homura had turned her back to Kyubey and was walking back toward Mitchiko.

"This is not a threat. It's a fact." The little pest was following her.

Homura didn't want to hear his fatalistic predictions. At first she thought he would tell her useful insight, like what was going on, but if he was going to be an annoyance and tell her about her doom, she preferred to get away as soon as possible. "Come on Mitchiko Shiori. We need to go on."

"Is Kyubey coming with us, desu-ka?"

Homura was about to reply but Kyubey beat her to it. "Yes. Yes I am."

"No he's not."

"Listen Homura, why do you want to save Madoka so much?" He was keeping pace with the two girls, trying to prove his point to a stubborn Homura. "Madoka herself wish her own death."

"I won't let her die!" Homura held Mitchiko close to her as they walked away, as if to protect her from the words of the white alien.

But the damned thing wasn't planning to go away anytime soon. "This choice is not in your power. You can't choose whether or not she will live. All you can do is to choose how she will die."

"AS IF I'LL DO SOMETHING LIKE THAT!"

The two girls took some steps away from the incubator. _He seems to have let go. Weird. I thought he wouldn't let give up easily_.

But his behavior was justified. In front of the trio was a young girl. One dressed all in black, with short blond hair cut just over the shoulders. Her more striking features were her two blood-red eyes, her unusually white skin and a large scythe half hidden behind her back. She seemed innocent and curious.

"Looks like we have company." Said Kyubey.

For a few seconds, nobody moved. Homura was trying to judge the danger this girl could represent, but failed at the sight of such a cute face. Akemi's warning about 'strange Puella Magis' completely slipped out of her mind.

It took her some time to snap out of it. When she did, she noticed the black girl hadn't move. She showed no sign of hostility whatsoever. On her lips was a strange smile, one of contentment Homura couldn't make sense of.

Then, suddenly, black words and sigils escaped from Homura's skin and went flying directly in the stranger's hand.

"What..t..?" Surprised, Homura didn't reacted fast enough and saw the strange girl run away. Whatever magic she had used, it hadn't harmed her in the least.

"Nee-chan! Are you okay!?" Mitchiko worried.

"Yeah…" She still wasn't sure herself what just happened, but she was fine. That much she knew. "Kyubey? Can you tell me _the fuck_ just happened?"

Looking in the direction Hachibey's creation disappeared, he replied calmly: "They got the last piece to kill Madoka."

.

(||—||)

.

And at the same moment, running toward the center of this whole mess, Sachiko couldn't help but smile.

_Master! Master, I did it! I have the means to do what you asked of me!_

It was all so simple now, so clear. The magic she just stole was simply binding magic. There was nothing fancy about it, nothing she wasn't able to copy on a weaker level.

All she had to do was to say a few words tainted in magic.

"You can die now."

The words left an inexpressible taste of joy on her lips. She accelerated the pace, eager to say those few words for real.

.

(||—||)

.

"Damn it! Where did she go?"

Homura was running after the girl, desperately trying to stop her from achieving her evil plot. Mitchiko was stumbling behind, fatigue quickly gaining her.

"Nee-chan…"

"We need to catch her before she does… whatever the hell she'll do. We need to stop her!" She pressed on forward, putting more and more distance between her and Mitchiko.

"Nee-chan… wait up…" She was doing her best to follow, but her little legs had not much strength left to hold her.

"Mitchiko Shiori. Come faster. We won't catch up otherwise." Homura didn't slow down as she spoke those words. Her only aim was that girl and the threat she represented to Madoka.

Then, there was a loud noise behind her that made her stop and look. Having pushed herself too far, Mitchiko had tripped and scrapped her hands on the concrete. She was falling of exhaustion.

Homura felt guilty. Guilty because she forced Mitchiko to run and she got hurt. She wasn't protecting her like she promised to Akemi and she couldn't leave her behind, but her heart only wanted to save Madoka one way or the other.

But she also realized that it was pointless to try at this point. There was no way she could catch that girl now. This brought tears to her eyes.

She was powerless.

Mitchiko stood up, wiping her painful hands on her shirt. When she saw her guardian silently crying on the floor, she found enough strength to run up to her. "I'm fine, desu! See? Just some scratches! So don't cry nee-chan!"

"I'm such a bad friend…"

The little girl gave a warm hug to Homura, trying to appease her sadness. "No you're not! You're the best of friends, desu! Akemi told me so, and I think so too."

"…Thanks…" She wanted to believe those words, really. But she still felt deep down that she had failed somewhere and that she wasn't worthy of being called a friend.

Judging the moment appropriate, Kyubey walked closer to the two girls still locked in an embrace. On a tone he wanted sympathetic, he made his last suggestion. "You can always make your goodbyes."

Homura thought about it for a second, holding back her tears. "Is it true? Is she really going to die?" She asked, ready to believe him.

In the same warm tone, Kyubey replied: "We, incubators, don't lie."

"I need to see it. I need to see her" She quickly stood up and looked around, searching for the shortest way to go to Madoka's home. She needed to see her friend one last time if she wanted to make proper goodbyes.

"Madoka is engaged in a fight at her house right now. If you climb this building, you will probably see it."

Losing no time, Homura took off to climb the stairs of the mentioned building, Mitchiko in her wake.

"One last thing, Homura." He called out. "I don't think Akemi should know of this."

"I know…" She replied while barely slowing down. _I know_.

.

(||—||)

.

Akemi was starting to recognize the streets as those in the neighborhood of her friend's house. She was getting there. Only a few more blocks and she could assess Madoka's safety. Almost there.

_Akemi? Are you there?_

_Yes, I am. I'm almost at Madoka's house right now. Where are you?_ Good, so Homura was safe. She had started to worry when her pursuers didn't come back. All of a sudden, it had became too peaceful, and she hadn't like it. Anyway, where did those two go?

_Wait, can you stand still for a moment?_

"Huh?" It was a weird request, but Akemi complied and stopped running for an instant. _Okay? Are you close to me?_

_No. That's not what I wanted to tell you._

_Then what is it?_

_Remember what we talked about earlier in the day? About me bearing despair and you bringing hope?_

Akemi took some time to answer back, not knowing where this discussion was going. _Yes, I remember._

_I did my share of the deal. Now it's time for yours._

_What? What did you do? _What could she mean by 'my share of the deal', Akemi worried. _Are you committing suicide right now?_

She could hear Homura laugh lightly at the other end of the telepathic link. _Don't worry, _she said, still laughing a bit, _I'm not planning on suicide anytime soon. It's just that I understand now. I understand that sometimes it's good to cry, and other times it's better to laugh. I understand that determination can be a strength or a weakness, and that it is better to fight with friends than all alone. So I'm okay now. I can deal with pain on my own. _

_Are you sure?_

_Yeah. Don't forget that I have Mitchiko to cheer me up!_

_Yeah, Mitchiko-chan is good for that. _Akemi chuckled briefly before remembering the seriousness of the current situation. _But what about Madoka?_

From the top of the building, Homura could see the repercussions of the battle, catching from time to time a glimpse of Madoka. Each time it was a shock to see her in her black tainted outfit with barely any pink left, willingly taking hits as if she was begging for death to come. Seeing her like this confirmed what Kyubey had told her: it had turned out so bad that death was the only salvation for her friend. And she didn't want Akemi to take part in it._ I can see her from here._ _She won't need your help. So the only thing left is for you to make the jump._

_So this is a final goodbye then?_ Asked Akemi.

_I guess it is. Take good care of the other me for me. And Madoka._

_I will. _Akemi lifted her arm on which was strapped the shield.

_Oh, and Mitchiko wants me to relay to you that she loves you._

_Thanks. _With a smile, Akemi grabbed the magical artifact on her arm. _I love her too._

She then turned the hourglass, and the world around her vanished in the mazes of time.

Two last words were lost in the interrupted exchange:

_Good luck._

.

(||—||)

.

The sun was engaging it's decent and yet the fight hadn't stopped. On one side, Madoka, tireless; and on the other the half-witches, aberrations with inhuman endurance and power. But one side was clearly gaining the advantage with time.

Madoka had made progress too. It was just progress toward dying. She started to understand the mechanics of her curse, what it prevented her from doing and what it allowed her to do. For example, she couldn't willingly cross over her gem's range, and she was forced to resist when one of her opponents tried to push her over, but if she put herself in a position in which she couldn't resist, the cursed wouldn't stop her.

And as such she brought the fight to the air, a place where there was nothing to grab, nothing to stop your movements and no ground that offered unwanted resistance. She was dancing in the air, coming ever closer to the invisible threshold with each step of the waltz.

_Madoka._

Oh, no. She didn't want to listen to _this_ voice, the one that kept her away from the only thing she truly desired in her life: death. So she tried her best to ignore it like the others, but this one was more persisting.

_Madoka, I realized I did awful things to you. I can't exactly apprehend the extent of what you endured, but I lived my own hell of guilt._

Sachiko came into the opening of Madoka's street. The fight was raging a few hundred feet in front of her. She spotted the pink girl shrouded in black among the many girls in the fray and started to make her way toward her. She just needed to come close enough for her target to hear the magic words.

_I just wanted to tell you that whatever I did, I regret it a thousand times over. Even if it's meaningless in comparison, I wanted to make up for it. _

Madoka was startled by the voice, a moment of inattention that allowed a pair of chains to send her crashing down. Could this be real? Could she really mean that…

_I won't restrain you anymore. You'll be free to do as you wish._

"…Homura…" Tears of joy came to Madoka, and she couldn't stop the flow. She didn't want to. She was too happy to even care.

_Kyubey told me what I had to do. But before I do it, I wanted to tell you goodbye._

When the half-witches came looking for her, Madoka fought back with new strength, one guided with hope. The first two that stepped forward were almost instantly disintegrated in a bright pink light.

Madoka was beaming. She didn't need those girls anymore. They weren't girls in the first place, just some kind of dark nightmare that took a human shape.

In the blink of an eye, she pulverized another one.

_Madoka, I'd like to hear your voice. Just once more, and only if you wish to speak to me._

…_Homura-chan…_

She was going on a rampage. The eight girls she had been fighting for some time couldn't keep up with her. They disappeared one after another, returning to the shadows from which they came.

Only one remained, and she was calmly walking toward Madoka, waiting to be closer to speak.

_Thanks._ Homura said. There were some hesitations on her end of the link, but she stayed strong in those farewells. _Do as you please. _

A humongous weight was lifted from Madoka's heart. She was free at last!

"You can die now!" Screamed the last half-witch that remained. She had put as much magic into those four words as she could, and this was it. Little did she know that it had no effect now.

Madoka walked closer to her, savoring those few seconds of pure hope while they lasted. When she was at only an arm's length of Sachiko, she gave her brightest smile. "Thank you."

She then reached out to touch the other girl's forehead, and the girl known as Sachiko vanished in a flash of pink light like the other ones.

Madoka's cracked soul gem fell in pieces soon after, freeing to soul of an innocent girl who's been tormented by destiny. Her magic dissipated and nothing was left but a body lying on the floor.

She seemed to be peacefully asleep.

.

(||—||)

.

A few minutes later, Homura and Mitchiko descended from their vantage point. They walked to where the body laid and mourned over it, remembering the best moments they had lived with her. They then build a small grave of rocks and debris and carefully put Madoka inside, before burying her under some more rocks. In death, her face was freed of all worries and woes. She had that innocent look of the naïve student who laughed with Mami and Sayaka.

She was at rest now.

"Mitchiko?" Homura asked. They were standing in front of the grave, sole survivor of this dead town.

"Yes?"

"Let's leave this place. There is nothing left here, so let's move on."

"Nee-chan?" They started to walk away, leaving painful memories behind.

"Yes?"

"Do you think Akemi-nee-chan will be okay?"

Homura patted her on the head and smiled. "She will. I'm sure that right now, she's doing way better than us and that she's happy with everyone."

"We can be happy too, desu!"

"Yes, we can." She stared at the sky, where a few stars were starting to shine in the late afternoon. It was an end, and at the same time it was a new beginning. She will start a new life with Mitchiko and everything will settle down. "We finally can."

.

(||/|\||)

.

* * *

I came pretty close to name this chapter "Libera me from Hell", but I settled instead on just "Liberation".

So this is the end of the story in this timeline. Tomorrow, I'll post the epilogue where I'll show how things resolved in the next timeline.

Just a bit more and it's finished! :D


	19. Epilogue

Epilogue

* * *

.

(||\|/||)

.

Akemi had vanished from this world to enter the next one, the one of the day of the Walpurgis a month ago. Madoka had died and had taken with her all but two half-witches. Homura and Mitchiko had left. The city was now empty on all human life. All that was left was Kyubey, looking at the purple sky of the falling day, waiting. For once, he wasn't scheming anything, not planning anything, not doing anything. It was the first time in his whole life that he took such a moment of contemplation, of letting go. Everywhere on earth, at this very moment, every Kyubey stopped for this instant.

His last instants before his imminent execution.

He heard heavy steps behind him, ones he recognised immediately as his persecutor's. He didn't turn around to greet him.

Instead of killing him right here and now, Hachibey sat on the concrete, still having some things to discuss with him. "This is too easy. You surrendered without even putting a fight."

"Isn't that the usual rules concerning an execution?"

"Yes, but usually, when told they will be terminated, incubators go into a rampage and defect to the rules. And you're that kind of incubator, so I wonder why you didn't fight back. And here I thought I would actually enjoy your loss."

"What tells you that I have lost?" ask Kyubey, maliciously. "Everything went along my terms. I succeeded in creating the greatest despair Earth has ever known"

"What a waste it is if such a girl can't even become a witch!"

He smiled at the foolishness of his higher up. "That's why I allowed Akemi to go back in time once more. So that Madoka would become a witch."

.

(||—||)

.

In the new world, Homura Akemi was doing her best. Thousands of rocket launchers, a dozen of bombs, two collapsing electric towers, a fuel truck, a couple of anti ship missiles and many hundreds of thousand landmines. Still, nothing she could do seemed enough to deal with her monster of an opponent. The Walpurgis' laugh resounded in the ruins of the city, unfazed by a display of force that would have put the army to shame. She rose again, threatening, intimidating, insanely powerful.

Homura was not a match for this monster.

"Homura-chan!" Screamed Madoka, afraid for the safety of her friend.

"It's too much for her alone." Said Kyubey, watching intensely the fight. He felt something strange. Something coming from Madoka. Something impossibly strong that was trying to break free from her. He'll help with that..."You know I can make a contract at anytime."

Hesitant, Madoka took some time to think it through, but quickly made her mind when she saw Homura crash into a building and not get up immediately.

"I will!" She said with force and resolve. "Kyubey, I want to make a contract."

"What is your wish?"

"I wish to have the power to change any witch back to the girl she was before, to give her a second chance, and a third if necessary. I want to be able to shelter her and any other from the grief and give her the normal life she deserves."

"That wish would break the rules of the existence of witches!"

"I don't care what rules it break. This is my wish, so make it happen Incubator!"

A pink light formed all around Madoka and beamed to the sky in a tremendous display of power as her soul was removed from her body. She had power now, enough to shelter everyone she loved from grief and despair.

Or that's what she thought.

The beam grew larger and larger, and inside, Madoka took aim at Walpurgis with her bow of light.

However, exactly as she shot, at the exact moment her magic took form and was release from her soul, her soul gem exploded. The pillar of light she was in shifted from pink to black in the blink of an eye. Nobody noticed as Walpurgis disappeared in the single blast she shot; nobody noticed the small body of a young girl with black hair fall to her doom in the city far below. They all had eyes solely for the pillar of darkness that was taking shape, each thread of which was worth a lifetime of sorrow.

Homura couldn't take off her eyes from the place Madoka stood just an instant ago, utterly terrified. This... was not Kriemhild Gretchen!

.

(||—||)

.

"You see, Hachibey, we had it wrong since the beginning. Our way of harvesting energy was incomplete and foolish. There was a possibility out there that we over looked; the possibility that time wasn't a constant. Those girls, the Puella Magis, have a way to create new rules for the Magi system through their wishes. One of them, Homura Akemi, wished for the power to go back in time." He took a pause and turned to look at the large incubator behind him. "You know what this means?"

"Alternate timelines."

"Yes, but also so much more than that. It means there existed the possibility of harvesting energy from the future, and looping it back in time to before it was even created, thus increasing the fixed amount of energy in the universe. There was this kind of resource here, in the form of Homura Akemi. Each time she went back in time, she attached the despair of Madoka from the first timeline to the despair potential of the second. Each time, Madoka became more and more powerful, and so did her witch counterpart. I took advantage of that fact by giving her the totality of Earth's despair. And then I asked Akemi to finish the job and go back in time for me." He smiled at the thought of how he manipulated his girls. "Poor girl didn't know what she was in for."

.

(||—||)

.

Homura held on to the metal frame of the building she was on as a force wave erupted from the black pillar. The force was tremendous! It turned rocks to dust and trees to ashes. She could barely keep her eyes open through it, and lucky that she did because with the deflagration came a wall of darkness.

"Shit!" She protected herself behind her shield just in time to avoid being crushed by that wall of _things_. It was passing by her so fast that she couldn't really make sense of it. It was like passing through a dense field of tight threads. The black threads were all around her, preventing the light from reaching her eyes.

And then, without notice, it stopped.

But Homura still couldn't see. She was still in complete darkness, as if every light in the world had vanished at the same time. She couldn't even see her hand outstretched before her. She clumsily stood up, not knowing what happened nor what to do. The silence was growing more and more uncomfortable, especially after such a drastic event. Nothing moved, no sounds could be heard. It was as if everything around her was dead.

It was the first time this sort of thing happened to her. Why was she in complete darkness? What happened to Madoka?

She activated her soul gem to shed some light. At least this way she could see a few meters in front of her. Still shocked and confused, she started to walk, wishing to get out of this dark place. She often tripped on rock and debris and was mostly slowed down by the irregularity of the landscape she was on, one she guessed as rubble of mighty monuments and houses and stuff. She regularly sent telepathic messages to the void before her, hoping that maybe Kyubey or Madoka or any other Puella Magi would answer her.

But no answer came.

The atmosphere was dense and heavy. She felt like there were witches around every corner, every inch of this place. She felt like they could ambush her at anytime, and she was slowly getting paranoid by the threat.

But no witch came.

Seeing one would have at least been a relief, giving her something to aim for and some information on her environment. Instead, she was all alone in this darkness, with desolation and debris entering and leaving her small light radius as she walked by. She started to feel claustrophobic. _There's got to be some light somewhere, or at least the edge of that thing that blocks light_, she thought.

And there was.

After hours of walking in a straight line, she bumped into something. A wall. A wall of small black threads. Her soul gem was going crazy with signals, telling her that there were thousands of witches in front of her. Stretching her hand, she touched one of them. It _was_ a witch. Or no, more like it was a part of a witch with the individual power of a full fledge monster.

And Homura was not stranger to those threads. She recognised them for seeing them many times before. It was the body of Gretchen.

"Madoka..."

This was not normal. There was no way that Gretchen could become so big and powerful that it would cover all over Mitakihara.

And then some thoughts hit her.

What if it wasn't _just_ over Mitakihara? What if it's body expanded way larger than that, but only Mitakihara was enclosed like this? _How big is Gretchen this time_? Homura started to feel fear at the thought that she messed up badly this time. So badly that she couldn't even start to comprehend the final result. She couldn't stay there. No matter that she made sense of what was happening or not, she couldn't stay in this timeline anymore. She had failed once again, not knowing why or how, but she had failed. So she needed to leave.

She took her shield and turned the hourglass.

But nothing happened.

.

(||—||)

.

"Kyubey. You're just a fool! You let the time traveler escape. Even if you planned on such a thing as a despair link through universes, the girl still has the power to start things over again. It won't end the way you intended. You have absolutely no guaranty that this plan of yours will bear fruits, and you won't be there to harvest them. So what's the point?"

"Well, for starters, I can assure you that she won't be able to travel through time again. It's her own power that will prevent her from doing that." The though made him smile just a little. Oh, he would have liked to see Homura's face when she'll understand the time limit of a single month worth of time traveling! Or maybe she won't understand at all, which would be even more pleasant to watch. He could almost see her try again and again in frustration to travel back in time, tears on her face like those she dropped here so many times, slowly coming to the revelation that she was doomed by her own powers, and still the fear and the disarray showing on her face as she tried to make sense of her situation. Lovely.

"Do you have any proof supporting that theory?"

"I have none" He paused, thinking about his own motivations for a few seconds. "I believe this is what humans call faith."

"Disgusting..."

He resumed his speech, knowing Hachibey was growing impatient. "I die here. But really, I don't mind. I leave you this world, without Madoka; with the Walpurgis Night defeated and her human avatar preferring to end her life instead of turning into the new Walpurgis. I leave you this empty shell, where you'll just continue to farm small girls like I did for thousands of years."

As Kyubey kept talking, Hatchibey's eyes started to glow red and blue, activating the terminal process for the white incubator. He had enough of him and his crazy plans. It was time for him to disappear. Kyubey's body started withering, quickly falling to dust that got lost in the wind. All Kyubeys everywhere were disintegrating, but still, he continued talking to Hatchibey even as his body disappeared.

"For my part, I will exist in a world home to the greatest witch that ever existed, one that can encompass stars and galaxies into her form, one that is almost capable of reversing entropy all by herself, one that will lead the other me to understand the same truth I came up here, and I will be the one that created her and that will harvest her." The disintegration was reaching his cat-like face, but even then he was displaying a large Cheshire smile. In the last few seconds of his life, Kyubey was reduced to a withering smile, whispering with absolute contentment his last words to the world:

"I

have won!"

* * *

THE END

Finally!

When I first started this story, I was thinking of writing something of about 20.000 words, not 75.000! I surprised myself by going this far. I guess the story had a life of its own and forced me to write it :)

I wanted to thanks Art and Sergio Turbo for having supported me as long as they did. They also wrote what I think are the two best comments ever!

Art: "You monster! You're a very evil human being and I love your story!" 8D

Sergio Turbo: "The clash between Homura's cool attitude and the ridicolousness of throwing cars around is so WIN that I can't find any way to describe it better." 8DDDDDDD

I also want to thanks Faust91x and Arthur091 and FFLurker and Nemuri-hime626 and... oh boy I need to stop! Getting too emotional here 8) I'm just so happy this story is finished that I feel like I could embrace the world 8D

On a side note, could anyone recommend my story on TvTrope? I would really apreciate that. I think it's the only thing that could make me more happy than I am right now! Thank you! (^.^)

I don't plan to do another fanfiction for the moment (although I do have an idea for some Charlotte/Mami shipping...). Instead, I wanted to finish correcting this story (looking back on the first chapters, there are tons on mistakes :\) and adding visuals on deviantart. After that, I'll change style and draw a Nuzlocke comic also on deviantart. Wish me luck!


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